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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26420836">BBIAB (be back in a bit)</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/thefirstpath/pseuds/thefirstpath'>thefirstpath</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Naruto</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Crossover, Harry Potter has common sense, Konoha is a mess, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Shinobi kill people fairly graphically, Strong Harry Potter, The ninja are confused and concerned, The shinobi system is a mess, Violence, and is not impressed by this ninja business, cursing, magic is amazing</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-09-12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-04-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 02:35:13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>43,063</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26420836</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/thefirstpath/pseuds/thefirstpath</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>'I hope I didn’t end up in another country somehow,' Harry thought, reluctantly amused at himself. That would be just his luck. After dozens of successful time-jumps, the moment of truth is where he screws it up and somehow ends up in 1960’s Argentina or Brazil.</p><p>OR: Harry gets significantly more lost than expected.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Harry Potter &amp; Hatake Kakashi, Harry Potter &amp; Sarutobi Asuma, Harry Potter &amp; Uchiha Itachi, Relationship Tags to Be Added</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>821</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>1614</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Clever Crossovers &amp; Fantastic Fusions, I Read this instead of Sleeping, Japanese Approved, Rhyne's Chakra Coils, The Harry Potters, Yubi Great Crossovers</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. windswept</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Harry looked around at the gigantic trees towering above the small clearing, baffled. The air was heavy with the scent of wet moss and soil, that deep-forest fragrance all large gatherings of trees seemed to accumulate. It was beautiful and lush. And it was completely wrong.</p><p><em>Damn it</em>.</p><p>He stared down at the holly wand for a moment and grimaced. Hermione had been right – a little more practice with the experimental time-turner would probably have been in order before attempting a big jump. He scratched the back of his head with the butt of his wand in thought. Well, too late for regrets now. The flora was unfamiliar and the trees unusually big even for a magical forest, which was a definite clue of some kind. One he couldn’t read yet.</p><p><em>I hope I didn’t end up in another country somehow,</em> Harry thought, reluctantly amused at himself. That would be just his luck. After dozens of successful time-jumps, the moment of truth is where he screws it up and somehow ends up in 1960’s Argentina or Brazil.</p><p>A sound in the trees behind him interrupted his musings.</p><p>Harry shot a glance over his shoulder, turning partially in preparation. Not the most discrete movement if he’d been followed or if this was some kind of muggle dwelling, but it put him in a better position to cast a <em>Homenum Revelio</em>. The wash of magic fanned out like an exhalation of air and a ripple of tension climbed Harry’s spine when the outline of a person crouched in the tree twenty meters to his right was revealed. <em>A Death Eater?</em> There were few enough of them left after the Ministry round-up, but with Harry’s luck it was a possibility.</p><p>Before he could decide what to do, a bright slash of fire lit up the forest and the scent of wet moss was expelled by the choking smell of smoke and ash. Leaves crisped and fluttered to the ground in black flakes, grass and moss shriveling and the air wobbling with the force of the heat.</p><p>
  <em>Fuck.</em>
</p><p>“Protego!” The shield flickered up before him. Harry huffed out a tight breath, watching the flames curl and flare harmlessly against the shield<em>. </em>A faint physical echo of the heat was all he felt through its protection.</p><p>
  
</p><p><em>Merlin, that was close</em>. The human-revealing spell was still active, but the presence was gone and the area completely devoid of human life. Harry relaxed his jaw and forced himself to loosen the grip on his wand, cocking his head to listen. Faint sounds of battle coming from the east pierced the stillness after the fire.</p><p><em>Alright Potter, think</em>. He rubbed his thumb against the familiar ridges of the wandwood, eyes roving over the surrounding damage. The strange fire-spell had clearly been meant for the person hidden in the tree, because that tree was by far the most severely charred. Whoever cast the spell had good aim. That in turn probably meant that the hidden presence hadn’t been a Death Eater sneaking after him to kill him, but one of at least two participants in a fight.</p><p><em>Okay, alright. First things first.</em> He cast the hearing-improvement charm with a twirl of his wand and focused. Suddenly the sounds of battle seemed much closer and the details of the fight clearer. There was the constant sharp clash of metal against metal, the breathy rush of fire and intermittently a sound like a water conjuration being cast against something soft.</p><p><em>I should leave</em>, Harry thought, eyeing a gap between two of the gigantic trees. <em>I should </em>definitely<em> leave,</em> he thought more firmly as he surveyed the ash-blackened vegetation. A beat of silence in the faraway fight was immediately followed by a ringing scream and before even making a conscious decision to, Harry <em>moved</em>.</p><p>He leapt forward with a chain of Apparitions, moving through the forest like only a wizard could until he was close enough to see the duelers. On scorched earth with smoke still wafting through remnants of grass, three people lay spread-eagle with blank eyes open and gazes set skywards. Harry’s lips tightened with unease. Dead, no doubt. Two of them with throats slit, their drying blood starkly red in the sunlight. The third had a small triangular knife driven cleanly into an eye. Harry forced away lightning-quick mental images that erupted as soon as he took in the scene – Lavender with her throat opened by Greyback’s teeth – Remus – <em>Fred</em> –</p><p>The images didn’t come too often these days, thankfully. And the war had taught him practicality in the face of horror. How to shunt unwanted thoughts to the side and focus on the material -- so that was what he did.</p><p>He’d heard of wizards using swords or rapiers, of course, but never little knives. <em>Though it’s not like I’ve done much research about the wizarding world</em>, Harry thought, slightly abashed and with his gaze still fixed on the bodies below. Better safe than sorry, though. He cast the imperturbable charm over his shirt, shoes and trousers. Just in case.</p><p>Another<em> Homenum Revelio</em> revealed the presence of three other living people in the vicinity. He leaned around a gnarled tree trunk blocking the view and squinted to catch sight of them. Two adult fighters against one teenage boy. Not much of a duel, in other words.</p><p>“Impedimenta,” he murmured, wand carefully aimed and half-concealed in his sleeve the way Aurors kept them. One of the adult fighters slowed, half-tripping over his own legs, and Harry smiled slightly at the successful interference.</p><p>Then the boy stabbed the stumbling man in the neck.</p><p>Blood spurted out in a gurgling fountain and Harry’s throat clenched in an involuntary swallow. That – that wasn’t quite what he’d expected. His gaze flickered to the dead men on the ground. Had the boy –? All of them –?</p><p><em>This is what I get for interfering in a fight I know nothing about</em>. The other adult fighter was circling the field like a shark around a high-tide snack and Harry noticed patches of dark moisture on the boy’s shirt. Injured probably, though that wasn’t slowing him down. Both of them had little knives in hand, the metal flickering with their movements and – they sped up, faster, <em>faster</em> and suddenly following their movements was like following spell-light or the snitch in rain. The blur of their bodies only stopped when their knives clashed or a fist met a body.</p><p><em>Are there spells that can give you that kind of speed? </em>Harry had never heard of such a thing, but considering the enormous number of spells in existence, it was a definite possibility. Or if not a spell, then a potion. Wizards learned to follow the razor-quick flashes of light many spells produced simply by spending most of their childhoods casting and watching spells being cast, but Harry couldn’t recall seeing a wizard move this quickly on foot. Well -- maybe Remus in wolf form.</p><p>“Impedimenta,” Harry cast again when the two fighters stopped for a brief second, their knives hooked around each other. The adult fighter froze and Harry watched uneasily as the tip of the boy’s blade slid into the hollow behind the man’s ear. Helping out here was probably definitely a mistake, but that was a group of adults clearly trying to kill a boy –</p><p>Something bumped against his spine. Harry spun around, armed hand twitching up automatically. Then he blinked. Blinked again. The same boy holding a bloody knife in the clearing below was also sitting on a branch in the canopy of a maple tree up ahead.</p><p>Without taking his eyes off the kid, Harry spotted the knife that had bounced off his Imperturbed shirt in his peripheral view. <em>So a twin with even better aim than the fire-caster from before,</em> Harry thought slightly wildly. If he hadn’t charmed his shirt, the boy would probably have severed his spine.</p><p>“Who are you?” said the boy, voice surprisingly deep for his apparent age. He looked about twelve, with longish black hair and – red eyes. A band of tension climbed up Harry's back at the sight.</p><p>“I’m Harry.” He tried not to see Voldemort’s face superimposed over the kid’s, deliberately focusing his gaze on the bridge of the boy’s nose. What would cause eyes like that, other than dark magic of some kind?</p><p>“You are not Rock,” said the boy and Harry blinked.</p><p>“What?”</p><p>The red eyes narrowed. “You are not a Rock-nin.”</p><p>“No,” Harry said slowly, because he definitely wasn’t a ‘Rock-nin’, whatever that was.</p><p>“Why did you assist in the fight?”</p><p>No gratitude there. The boy’s lips were white with tension, like assisting in his fight was some kind of threat. Like Harry was still a threat, even though he was just standing there and clearly not trying to finish what the now-dead adult fighters had started.</p><p>“Because they were trying to kill you,” Harry said, wondering if he should just Apparate away and leave the boy twins be. His stupid saving-people-thing always got him into these kinds of crappy situations. It was about time he started bucking tradition and focused on looking out for himself.</p><p>But because he was an idiot or suicidal or just hopelessly Potter-ish, Harry did not Apparate away. He could imagine Hermione’s pursed lips as she pondered whether to smack him about the head for endangering himself or for indulging his saving people thing.</p><p>“Why did you assist?” the boy repeated, eyes narrowing further. “If you were allied with Leaf you would have identified yourself.”</p><p>Harry felt the bafflement creep over his face and didn’t bother trying to stop the expression from forming. <em>Rock… Leaf… Huh?</em> There was the sensation of missing something both obvious and important and Harry deliberated whether he cared what that something was.</p><p>“I don’t know what you’re talking about, you ungrateful brat,” he finally said, enunciating carefully and hoping he didn’t sound as edgy as he felt. The boy drew back like a startled cat, as if that was the last reply he’d expected. “And you’re welcome for the save.”</p><p>“I did not require your <em>altruistic</em> assistance,” said the boy, lips still white and tense. The distrust was clear in his voice, but Harry couldn’t be bothered to decipher the exact reason for its presence. Was this place, wherever this was, so unfeeling that a young boy couldn’t count on assistance when surrounded by adults trying to kill him?</p><p>“Right,” said Harry, because whatever. The adult fighters were no longer a threat, so he had no reason to stumble further into this bizarre side-quest. He was going back to England. Anyway, the murderous kid clearly wasn’t bleeding to death. “Before I leave, do you want bandages? Ban-<em>da</em>-ges,” Harry repeated when the kid remained stone-faced. He was no healer, but conjuring bandages was fairly easy.</p><p>“You will not leave,” said the kid’s voice from behind him. Something bounced against his Impertubed shirt again and Harry caught a flash of movement behind him.</p><p><em>Ducklifors</em>, Harry didn’t have time to say, just think, and the other kid’s little knife morphed into a teeny tiny angry-looking duck.</p><p>The boy’s eyes widened for the briefest moment, but that was enough for Harry to think <em>Flipendo</em> and send him careening backwards through the air. Huh. Perhaps he was getting the hang of wordless casting after all.</p><p>“You – a bloodline limit?” the identical boy in the tree asked, staring at the little duck waddling around Harry’s feet. Harry had the impression that he was trying hard not to sound mystified. The boy twitched when the duck let out a miserable little quack and the suspicious look that followed was difficult not to laugh at. “…You’re not using chakra.”</p><p>Harry understood none of that, but based on the boy’s reaction to the spell he probably wasn’t a wizard. Muggles couldn’t move like the boy and his opponents had, though. Harry was pretty sure of that. <em>In conclusion – what the hell?</em></p><p>The boy looked up at him again, face grim. “I’m sorry, but you can’t be allowed to leave.”</p><p>It was fortunate that Apparition was instantaneous, because otherwise Harry would certainly have gotten punched in the face. He could see the boy through the trees, arm outstretched and hand curled into a fist. It took a second for the boy to disappear, the image of him blurring with movement. Harry cast <em>Homenum Revelio </em>again and Apparated the instant the spell’s power flared out because <em>bloody hell</em> the boy was only a couple of paces away.</p><p><em>That speed is ridiculous,</em> Harry thought, heart beating a drum solo into his throat. The boy stared at him from about a yard away, head tilted like a sparrow listening for worms in the ground.</p><p>“I was just trying to help you, you know,” he said, regretting that choice with all his might. When he finally got back to England, Hermione was going to say ‘I told you so’ and Ron was going to point and laugh. He thought for a moment and with another twist of his wand, cast a Membrana shield over himself. It was long-lasting and transparent and thus better for stealth, but not nearly as strong as a <em>Protego</em>.</p><p>“If you’re trying to help, why run?”</p><p>It took effort not to twitch in surprise. Casting a wide-eyed look over his shoulder, Harry spotted a tall man with a head of spiky hair leaning back on a tree. The man’s hair was the same shade of silver-grey as Fleur Delacour’s, which was a truly pointless detail to notice – <em>Focus, Potter!</em></p><p>“Because your little friend didn’t seem to appreciate it that much.” It came out more flippant than Harry meant for it to.</p><p>“Where are you from?”</p><p>“England.” Harry eyed the man carefully. Something about his posture reminded him of Greyback, all tightly coiled strength in a purposefully careless package.</p><p>The man shifted a little. “Hmm. I don’t recall any town by that name in Fire country. It must be a very small village.”</p><p>“I’m not from Fire country,” Harry said. There was a tightening in his shoulders. If this man thought England was a town or a village, that meant he had no idea what England was. And if he didn’t know what England was, then Harry was probably <em>extra</em> screwed.</p><p>The man cocked an eyebrow. “Maa, it’s illegal for foreign shinobi to wander around Fire country.”</p><p>“I’m a bit lost,” said Harry, giving up and rubbing his forehead. What the hell was Fire country? What the hell was a shinobi?</p><p>The man was wearing some kind of cloth mask over most of his face, but there was the impression of a smile curving his only visible eye. The expression set Harry’s teeth on edge. “Where were you trying to get to?”</p><p>Harry shifted on his feet, casting another <em>Homenum Revelio</em>. The boy had shifted to stand half a yard behind him and his twin was nowhere to be found. The three of them were the only people around for now, but Harry felt distinctly surrounded.</p><p>“I was trying to get home.” That hadn’t been his original purpose, but it was now the definite priority. This damn time-turner clearly wasn’t working right. He hadn’t traveled in time, he’d traveled to a different place. Or worse, perhaps a different world entirely. “And I’m not a ‘shinobi’.”</p><p>The man slouched forward, hands in his pocket. Harry didn’t trust the easy grace in his movements, like a veela on the verge of transformation or a vampire on a bloodhunt. He reinforced the Membrana shield, shifting slightly to put his wand-hand in back.</p><p>“Such distrust!” The man was still smiling with what little was visible of his face. The hair on Harry’s arms prickled. The boy behind him held still, but now he was crouched in the knee-high grass.</p><p>From one fraction of a second to the next, Harry’s wrist was trapped in a vice grip. His free hand, thankfully. The shield still held like a second skin over his own and thus the man’s hand was not truly on him. He wasn’t truly captured.</p><p>Harry sucked in a breath and Apparated.</p><p>From the far side of the open field, he watched the two stare him down. The man with silver hair still had his hand slightly outstretched. As Harry watched, the man pushed the metal plate covering his eye up to his forehead. The revealed eye was the same awful red as the boy’s and Harry frowned. Maybe everyone in – wherever he was, Fire country or whatever, had one or more red eyes. <em>Extremely fast and unusual eye-color</em>, Harry thought, eyebrows drawing together in thought. Perhaps they weren’t human.</p><p>The <em>Homenum Revelio</em> alerted him to movement. Harry followed his immediate instinct and Apparated even further away. They were too fast for him to stand around and try to think up a plan. He moved forward in gigantic leaps, crossing several yards in less than a second<em>. Thank god for magic</em>, he thought, Apparating up a mountain breaking through the blue of the sky in the far distance. He crashed down onto a rough shelf on the mountainside and staggered to his knees on the craggy rock surface.</p><p>The air was a thin, cold mist with clouds forming a low enough ceiling above him that he could probably have used a first-year propulsion charm to reach them. Another <em>Homenum Revelio</em> showed nobody around, thank Merlin. Harry cast a notice-me-not on the immediate area and slumped down gracelessly.</p><p><em>I wonder how high up I am</em>, he thought, still half-kneeling and eyed the steep slant down the side. The ground wasn’t visible from here. No people or animals around and no way for those two to know exactly where he’d gone.</p><p>Now was the perfect time to take a moment to freak out, so Harry did just that before finding himself laughing at his typical Potter luck. <em>No more experimental time-turners after this.</em> He closed his eyes, focused on the three Ds of Apparition and thought so hard it ached of home.</p><p>There was no swooping sensation in his stomach. None of the awful tugging behind his navel that all long-distance Apparition caused. There was nothing but the swooping sensation of magic without direction.</p><p>Harry breathed out tightly, letting himself fall into a cross-legged position on the cold rock. No point in panicking when he’d already allowed himself his one (1) allotted freak-out per day. Apparition was strong magic, though. He and Hermione had crossed all of England to reach Godric’s Hollow that one time and they hadn’t even known where it was even located. If he couldn’t reach his home, the one place he’d Apparated to over a hundred times, then he was catastrophically lost.</p><p><em>Where did the damn time-turner throw me?</em> Harry didn’t notice how hard he was gritting his teeth until the muscles in his jaw protested. Fire Country, shinobi, Rock-nin – he’d heard none of these terms before and that didn’t bode well. He’d heard of dimension-hopping though. A couple of books about the Veil he’d combed through after Sirius’ death mentioned that until the ghosts of people sent through it started showing up in its chamber, many had originally thought the Veil led to a different dimension. All the books had mentioned dimension-hopping as the real deal, something rare but not unheard of.</p><p>Harry shivered in the cold foreign air.</p><p>Alright. <em>Alright</em>. Information first. Or maybe security first and then information. Not every single person in this place could be a hostile mini-murderer. Probably. But either way, he had to be prepared for more things to go wrong. That was how his life usually went, after all.</p><p>His mind whirred away. Arresto Momentum could slow down physical speed, but Harry hadn’t practiced it much. He’d have to rectify that. And he’d have to be careful to always keep a shield of some kind active. Probably add something flame resistant too – well, the Membrana worked against fire, was easy to keep up and might do for now.</p><p><em>I should check to make sure the time-turner didn’t break or anything… </em>Harry rolled up his sleeve, unstrapped the mokeskin pouch from his arm and dug the damn thing out. The glass core was undamaged and the golden bindings holding firm, but where in the center there had previously been an old-school watch-face there was now nothing. No number, no clock hands. Just a smooth pearly surface that faintly reflected the green of Harry’s eyes back at him.</p><p><em>Fuck,</em> Harry thought, very loudly.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Harry is about to get in way over his head... but so are the shinobi. &gt;:)</p><p>I haven't written anything in years and this is my first go on Ao3, so feedback would be nice if you feel like giving it. I'll add more tags later and am willing to take tag suggestions! I'm mostly writing this because I don't think Harry gets enough credit and because I think magic is amazing and OP as fuck and also doesn't get enough credit.</p><p>...I was doing research for this fic by rereading Naruto and good gods shinobi in canon are dumb and loud and terrible at keeping their mouths shut!! wtf. I've spent so long reading fanfics that I'd forgotten what they're like in canon. x.x jfc Kishimoto.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. recon</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Backlit by the dark orange of the setting sun, the Hokage looked like a spiritual icon swathed in divine light. The drifting smoke from his pipe barely dented that image, but his weary expression did more to take away from it. Sometimes it was difficult to remember just how old the Sandaime was, and other times every line in his face stood out like canyons in a weather-worn mountainside.</p><p>“What do you make of this temporary supposed ally?” He eyed the little duck that was currently sleeping on his desk with its head under its wing.</p><p>Kakashi’s perpetual slouch belied his alertness, but Itachi stood as straight and sharp as a kunai. No pretension there, for better or worse. And no glancing at the duck, at feat Kakashi didn’t quite manage.</p><p>“I had the impression that his confusion was real,” Itachi said, his mouth muffled by the mask he’d re-donned on their way back. Show-off missions were a hassle and neither of them had liked the lack of anonymity. “He spoke with an accent I did not recognize and was not dressed like a Fire country inhabitant.”</p><p>“There are pockets of Fire country with different customs. Different clothes and norms,” Kakashi added. Some people had refused to give up the Warring States era standards for one reason or other. “But I otherwise agree with ANBU Owl. His accent was foreign.”</p><p>The Hokage took a slow pull of his pipe. “Lightning country?”</p><p>“<em>Ma-a</em>, don’t think so. But I can’t say for sure.” Lightning country was no fan of Fire country and borderline hostile to Leaf. That made missions in that country rare, as any potential screw-up could cause an international incident. And Kakashi was no undercover specialist and hadn’t had any reason to memorize Lightning country accents.</p><p>Itachi’s mask twitched downwards. The Hokage’s gaze released Kakashi and flowed to Itachi in a slow wave of attention.</p><p>“Though I was unable to ascertain the reason, I believe that his intention was to help.” There was a pause as Itachi gathered his thoughts. Unusual for the Uchiha heir. “That is not to say that he had no underlying motive. But if he was attempting to curry favor with Leaf or had a personal vendetta against the Rock-nin, leaving as soon as he was able to after the fight’s end seems an irrational choice. He made no attempts to speak to either of us further, he did not retaliate with lethal force after my attacks on his person and he did not appear interested in the dead Rock-nin.”</p><p>Itachi spoke evenly, but Kakashi had the sense that there was a slight disquiet behind the words. The source of that disquiet was anyone’s guess, though. ANBU’s newest recruit was near unreadable even with the mask off and with it on he was close to an impenetrable wall.</p><p>“Do you believe the teleportation to be a bloodlimit?” the Hokage asked, tapping ash into the ashtray and re-prepping the pipe. The scent of tobacco leaves fanned through the room.</p><p>“Unclear,” Kakashi said when Itachi seemed to realize he’d filled his spoken-word quota for the day. “But he wasn’t using chakra.”</p><p>He’d only ever met one person with a teleportation technique like that. Kakashi circled the thought, tasted it and found it faintly bitter.</p><p>“He didn’t use chakra to turn my kunai into a – duck either,” Itachi said, almost stumbling over the peculiarity of the sentence. Kakashi held back a snort of amusement, though there was some bewildered curiosity in him as well. The duck hadn’t reverted into a blade again and even with the Sharingan activated, it appeared to be an utterly ordinary duck. No illusions to break there.</p><p>It even quacked.</p><p>The Sandaime nodded, the wrinkles around his eyes deepening when he frowned in thought. “If he is a shinobi, he cannot be allowed to move about Fire country unimpeded. However, if he poses no clear threat and his motives have yet to be discerned, there is no reason to attempt elimination on sight.”</p><p>His gaze flickered to Kakashi. “Can your summons track him?”</p><p>“Only where he’s passed on foot, Hokage-sama.” Tracking teleportation was very different from tracking a Shunshin. A shinobi still moved on foot when using a Shunshin, but whatever technique the foreigner had used carried him across the space he was traversing without meeting the ground once. Despite witnessing it with the Sharingan ready to consume and dissect, Kakashi hadn’t been able to copy it.</p><p>Kakashi spotted paper lanterns and neon signs flickering on outside, the last vestiges of sunlight giving way to blue night air. The village was still bustling, but soon the civilians and most shinobi on leave would disappear into their houses and apartment buildings.</p><p>The Hokage folded back into the chair with a sigh and Kakashi sensed that they were about to be dismissed. “Give it your best try. I will put out a B-level yellow alert among the general forces.”</p><p><em>Potential hostile. If seen, alert back-up.</em> Probably with add-ons about not engaging the target using lethal means.</p><p>“Dismissed.”</p><p>Itachi saluted with razor-sharp precision and Kakashi sketched a short bow. They stalked out into the tower reception area with its tired chunin secretary and its bored guards, none of whom paid them any mind. Itachi nodded to Kakashi before flickering away, leaving him standing there in unsettled dust. Kakashi shoved his hands into his pockets and stalked out.</p><p>Itachi could hit the sack, but Kakashi was in for a long night. The evening air was crisp and pleasant on the skin, but he’d have to eat a ration bar or half a soldier pill before setting out and that took the simple pleasure out of it. Their mission had taken twice as long as intended, all because Intel had the drop-off point noted in the wrong place. Unnecessary, unplanned fights were a bother even when you weren’t ordered to make a statement. Damn Rock-nin and the politics that ate its way into every mission dealing with Hidden Stone.</p><p>Kakashi hopped up to the roof of the Hokage Tower, bit his thumb and summoned the whole pack. He’d have to bribe them with treats for this.</p><p> </p><p>Itachi divested himself of his mask and armor the moment he set foot in his room. His parents’ chakra was still with sleep in the master bedroom, so he would be spared the tiresome diversion of their questions. There was a slight pang in his chest as he thought of Sasuke. By returning so late he’d broken another promise of training. Breaking promises was all he seemed to be doing lately.</p><p>It was too late to shower and utilizing a water jutsu would certainly wake his parents, so Itachi cleaned himself as well as he could with his field toiletries. He wouldn’t take his rest in the futon without cleaning himself thoroughly, so he settled by the desk when he was done. It would do. Itachi doubted he’d be able to sleep regardless.</p><p>It had absolutely been the right choice to treat the interfering foreign teenager as a threat. People didn’t appear from thin air and then decide to help in an unrelated fight. But try as he might, Itachi could not shake the faint guilt at having attacked someone who had later proved not to be a threat. Or not a <em>current</em> threat, at any rate.</p><p>Fugaku was right to lecture him about softness, Itachi thought. There was no room for guilt in the field, not when he had acted as a shinobi should.</p><p>Sometimes Itachi wondered if everyone could see this weakness in him.</p><p>“Big thoughts so late at night,” said Shisui, popping in through the window like a jack-in-the-box. Itachi halfheartedly threw a kunai at him, which was slapped out of the air with ease. Shisui was caked with mud that scattered over the floor when he landed on the tatami. Itachi frowned.</p><p>“You good?” he asked when Itachi didn’t answer, black eyes flickering up and over him in assessment. But Itachi wasn’t like his ANBU captain – he didn’t hide injuries.</p><p>“Yes. The mission took longer than calculated.”</p><p>“No shit.” Shisui folded himself into the room’s lone chair and stretched like a cat. The smell of cigarette smoke clung to his uniform and Itachi’s nose crinkled. “Sasuke-chan was mad as a wasp when you didn’t return this afternoon -- no, <em>hey</em>, I didn’t mean it like that.”</p><p>Itachi had turned away to stare into the Konoha night, gaze catching on flickering restaurant signs and apartment lights in the distance.</p><p>“Shit happens, missions run late,” said Shisui, absolving him the way he couldn’t quite absolve himself. “Anything to share?”</p><p>“The Hokage is putting out a yellow alert --” Itachi explained the non-classified details of the encounter with the foreigner.</p><p>“So T&amp;I? Or potential recruitment?” Shisui asked.</p><p>“I believe the Hokage wishes for more information before deciding how to proceed.”</p><p>“Right.” Shisui leaned back, shoulders cracking when he stretched his arms over his head. “I wonder if his teleporting ability is faster than my Shunshin?”</p><p>That was an oblique request for Itachi’s own opinion, but Itachi had none to share. He made a small gesture that Shisui took for the shrug it was meant to imply.</p><p>“There’s something else, yeah?” He peered at Itachi like he could read the thoughts behind his dark bangs.</p><p>Itachi deliberated. The foreigner’s abilities weren’t classified, simply – difficult to phrase. He awkwardly explained the kunai-to-duck situation and twitched when Shisui burst out laughing. He hadn’t even gotten to the part where it had quacked angrily in his kunai pouch the whole way back.</p><p>“What the hell is that? A bloodlimit that turns weapons into <em>ducks</em>? ” He leaned back deeper in the chair, rubbing the heels of his hands into his eyes like he was trying to scrub the laughter from his face. “This world if full of bizarre genetics, eh? That’s the weirdest shit I’ve ever heard.”</p><p>“We don’t know if it’s a bloodlimit yet.”</p><p>“Yeah, yeah.” Shisui yawned. “My mission got moved up and I’m leaving tonight, that’s what I came to tell you before you distracted me with all these duck tales.”</p><p>“Alright. Thank you for informing me.” Shisui’s missions took him out of the village more often than Itachi’s did, since Itachi had heir duties to the clan but Shisui was closer to a normal shinobi. It had on occasion been a point of contention for both of them, but Itachi tried not to dwell on those fights.</p><p>“Don’t stay up too late,” Shisui threw over his shoulder before propelling himself through the window and into the night. A very rude way of leaving. Itachi frowned at the scattered leaves dotting the bedroom floor before glancing up and out at the night.</p><p>Hidden Leaf was the reason for his every breath and Itachi would do whatever it took to protect it. But sometimes, in the quiet of the night – he wondered –</p><p> </p><p>With his invisibility cloak wrapped around him in several layers, Harry sat like the meat of a sausage roll and peered down at the village below. It was small and busy, surrounded by fields of wheat and clusters of wildflowers. It was nothing like muggle London. No cars or telephone poles or anything visibly and undeniably ‘muggle’. There was also nothing Hogsmeade-like about it. No owls flying overhead, no spell-light flashing between the small wooden houses and no pointy hats or robes.</p><p><em>Not modern muggle, not magic.</em> Harry pushed himself deeper into the cloak’s shadow. He’d checked with the human-revealing spell and he was all alone here in this copse of trees just outside the village. All alone. In these very foreign lands.</p><p>He pushed his knuckles into his eyes until he saw stars.</p><p>The buildings didn’t even <em>resemble</em> what he remembered from England’s countryside. The houses in the village below had thin sliding doors that opened and shut at as people moved in and out. Bigger houses had rough-hewn wooden porches wrapped around the exterior, shadowed by snub thatch roofs. Wind chimes dangled from eaves and their faint clinking interrupted the disjointed drumbeat of hurried work.</p><p><em>Some kind of farmer’s village? A hamlet or whatever it’s called?</em> Harry wondered. He only really wondered to avoid acknowledging the now obvious truth of his situation. Because the truth was <em>bloody hell this is a totally different dimension</em> and focusing on that too hard would send him round the bend.</p><p>He’d taken his own inventory before moving off the mountain. One mokeskin bag with a book on household charms Ron’s mum had given him, some of Hermione’s handwritten notes he hadn’t even glanced at, two colorful cases of the twins’ candy, a couple of potion vials and a smattering of ingredients he’d forgotten in there at some point, and lastly the now seemingly dead time-turner.</p><p>That was less than ideal.</p><p>Way, <em>way</em> less than ideal.</p><p><em>I couldn’t have forgotten a book about dimensional travel in the bag?</em> Harry thought, pushing his chin into the dip between his raised knees. <em>Or a ‘ye olden tome’ about weapons fighting written by some 1600 century witch?</em></p><p>Well, from glancing over the book on household charms he could at least learn to spruce up a plain cream sauce. <em>Berula apollinaris – an essential spell for any housewitch’s dinner party!</em></p><p>Merlin, he was <em>screwed</em>.</p><p>But then again, he was always screwed. And never in the fun sense of the word together in bed with Ginny. Always in the sense of standing on a cliffs edge of disaster, waiting for a stiff breeze to knock him over.</p><p>Harry smothered a laugh into the crook of his elbow. Yeah, that was enough whining for now.</p><p>He put away the cloak and realized he should do something about the wand too. If these people didn’t know what a wizard was, running around with a stick in hand would draw eyes he wanted kept averted. He obviously couldn’t cast an invisibility spell over the wand itself, but he could wrap everything but the tip of the wand in a long strip of cloth spelled invisible.</p><p>Though none of the village’s people wore the same kinds of uniforms as the two fighters he’d encountered and there was no real reason to assume they’d be hostile, he cast the Membrana shield again and felt it reinvigorate with a sensation like thin plastic wrapping around him.</p><p><em>Constant vigilance!</em> echoed Mad-Eye Moody from within his memories.</p><p>Transfiguring one type of cloth into another wasn’t difficult, thankfully. He squinted down at the village until he had a good idea of what he could be seen wearing and waved his wand over himself, keeping an image of what he wanted in mind. The feeling of cloth threads rupturing into fiber and reforming was like winged insects fluttering over his skin.</p><p>He made his way down to the village on light steps, now clad in non-descript browns and greys. Information was the goal for now. That and the necessities, like food and a place to sleep. Who knew how long he’d be stuck here. <em>Not forever</em>, Harry promised himself, <em>but I should probably count on being stuck for a while before I figure this out.</em></p><p>Not a fun thought, but a realistic one. Hermione would be proud. Maybe. Or just worried and shrilly livid about being unable to burrow herself into library research. Harry smiled fondly at the mental image of a frazzled Hermione shouting at a tiny murderer about the lack of easy access to a library.</p><p>The village’s main street was a dirt road stomped into firmness by a thousand rushing feet. People were lugging wares over their shoulders, setting up wooden stands, carting water around and yelling to each other over the din of work.</p><p>It was a pretty good first impression, Harry thought. A sense of solidity and diligence in the people here, a sense of long-term community. Hufflepuff-ish, maybe. He glanced toward a source of drifting smoke and breathed in the intermingling scents of fresh-made foodstuffs. Spiced meat on skewers. Sauces in tiny pans. Bread baked as big as plates. Fresh fish sliced thin or laid out in chunks, both raw and cooked. Bowls of tightly packed rice drizzled with sauce.</p><p>His stomach clenched with an abrupt hunger.</p><p>“Sorry ma’am, how much for one?” he asked the old woman working the closest stand, eying the meat skewers. She lifted a tanned, weather-beaten hand to point at the price list.</p><p>“Right, sorry. Didn’t see it.” He flushed a little.</p><p>It should probably concern him that he could read the weird squiggly letters that definitely weren’t English. But that was a mystery to ponder later on. The more immediate mystery to solve was the how the hell he was going to pay for the food. All the stands had small tin boxes of coins and crinkled bills out front, so these people clearly used money to pay.</p><p>“Uh, hang on a moment…” Harry surreptitiously stuck pointed his wand at the half-opened box of coins before the woman. Then he vanished two of the bigger coins and on a harried breath, conjured them into his other hand. It required a sleight of hand Harry wasn’t quite used to. The woman plucked one of the coins from his palm and handed over the skewer, beaming at him with a mouthful of crooked teeth.</p><p>And Harry felt like a right bastard.</p><p>He stared down at the meat, inhaling the aroma and realizing that no – there was no way he could out-and-out steal from a poor old woman. He conjured the leftover coin back into the box and then bit into the meat. He did need to eat, but he <em>would</em> to find a way pay for it.</p><p>Face partially turned down as he chewed, Harry stared up through his lashes at the stand. It was a timeworn ramshackle thing. Clean and well-kept, but run-down. The stand legs were mended with small panels of wood and nails protruded in several places.</p><p><em>Maybe</em>, Harry thought, turning over the idea in his mind. <em>Maybe I can pay with service? She’ll never know, but I will. I’ll know that I didn’t just steal, that I gave something back.</em></p><p>He pointed his wand at one of the cracked and half-mended wooden stand legs. <em>Reparo</em>.</p><p>The wood knitted itself back together, cracks melding like edges of puzzle pieces slotting into place. He cast the spell again at two jutting nails and again at what looked like water damage in the corner of the rough counter. Again and again, changing nothing too visible but creating a firmer, more robust whole. The old woman wouldn’t have to worry about her stand collapsing on her.</p><p>Harry finished off his skewer and smiled.</p><p>The rest of the afternoon was spent collecting information and stealing money. He felt like crap every time and tried to aim for the stands that were clearly better-off and only take one coin from each, just to assuage the guilt. And he fixed something for each and every one of them. Even the one staffed by twin assholes that Harry itched to hex. At least they had the courtesy to gossip loudly and at great length while they let their old mother or young grandmother do all the actual work to tend the stand.</p><p>When Harry reached the small inn at the end of the main street, he had enough money to pay for the night. The rooms were clean and well-kept and though he could have made shelter for himself in the forest, he wanted somewhere clean and secure to consider the information he’d collected over the course of the day. About shinobi, hidden villages, wars, clans and bloodlimits.</p><p>About a village called Hidden Leaf.</p><p>About what the villagers called the gods’ red eye.</p><p>The famous <em>Sharingan</em>.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Comments very welcome! Both Kakashi and Itachi were a real struggle to write. My plan is for the story to be mostly from Harry's POV, but interspersed with other characters POVs from time to time. And I'm going to try updating regularly, though I'm not making any firm promises.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. univalve</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Several hours of frazzled thought later, there was a knock on the inn room’s door. Harry had warded it with every kind of ward he could think of, but he’d obviously forgotten to add <em>Repello Muggletum.</em></p><p><em>What are the odds of one of these ‘shinobi’ people politely knocking on the door?</em> Harry chewed the thought over for a couple of seconds. Hermione would probably yell at him if he just opened the door.</p><p>“Hello?” he called through the door, wand held at the ready just in case.</p><p>“Your room is dinner included, sir,” called a voice from the other side. There was the rattle of cutlery against porcelain and Harry relaxed his tense stance at the sound.</p><p>“Right, sorry,” he said and opened the door a fraction, just enough to catch a glimpse of the man standing in the corridor outside. Dressed similarly to the hostess in the reception area in front and balancing a porcelain bowl on a small cracked tray. Yeah, that seemed about right.</p><p>Harry opened the door fully and let the man inside.</p><p>“How are you findin’ your room, sir?” he said while setting up the table. “If there’s anythin’ lacking, please say so.”</p><p>“No, thank you,” said Harry. He eyed the man thoughtfully. Something wasn’t quite – right. His wand-arm tensed as that thought took root, shoulder pulling back slightly in preparation. Both professor McGonagall and professor Lupin had always been very clear about the importance of the right kind of stance when casting. Certain stances for casting against still opponents, others for casting spells with wide-area effects and so on. Hermione had made both Harry and Ron memorize them all, though most of them hadn’t even been on the OWLs.</p><p>When finished, the man bowed and stepped easily back out of the room. Harry deflated like a balloon, feeling slightly foolish. Still there was the prickle of hairs at his nape, a sense that he shouldn’t lower his guard too much. Probably stupid paranoia on his part, since the man had come and gone without making any hostile moves.</p><p>But the people of the village had talked about shinobi ‘dressing up’ and ‘playing pretend’. Trying to blend in with common civilians.</p><p><em>Tick-tock,</em> went his thoughts, <em>tick-tock</em>, the mental clock-hand jumping from one possible conclusion to another. Damn it, Hermione would probably have seen whatever-it-was immediately. <em>Think</em>, damn it. The man hadn’t acted strangely or said anything that stood out, his clothes were typical for the village –</p><p><em>Boom</em>. The realization was abrupt. The man was wearing the same kinds of open-toed sandals as the tiny murderer and his almost-veela friend.</p><p>Since he’d used his one-a-day allotted freak-out, he skipped right past the panic and tried to reason out if one of those ‘Leaf shinobi’ had sent the man here, or if shinobi from the other hidden villages also wore those kinds of sandals. Maybe civilians wore them too, sometimes?</p><p>He eyed the food the man had left. <em>Do these shinobi people use poison? Wait, would they actually poison people just like that?</em></p><p>Withdrawing his wand, he waved it over the bowl. “Specialis revelio.”</p><p>It lit up like a firework in his mind, sparks of purple, turquoise and yellow crackling behind his eyelids. Harry blinked rapidly. He hadn’t meant to close his eyes, but those colors went off like little explosions. <em>Merlin, that’s a lot of different ingredients.</em></p><p>The dark, splotchy colors were the only ones of interest though. Because those colors announced their intention to hurt. There were two of them mixed in with the firework of normal ingredient colors. Harry wasn’t sure what exactly they would do to him if he hadn’t checked the dish before eating, but he knew for certain that he didn’t want to find out.</p><p><em>So much for a safe room to sleep in.</em> He forced his shoulders to relax. The man had left, but he’d probably return soon enough to check his handiwork. Harry had to be on the move by then.</p><p>The setting sun painted the room’s peeling wallpaper in soft hues of pink and orange, pale shadows stretching across the floor. Harry packed up with a swish of his wand, mind a thousand miles away. From what he’d picked up today, Tanzaku Gai was a bigger civilian town not too far from this small village. He’d Apparate his way there and disappear amongst its crowds.</p><p>Harry looked over the room one last time, eyeing the bowl cooling on the table. The corner of his mouth hitched up. It was a terrible idea, but he was <em>so good</em> at terrible ideas.</p><p><em>The twins would be proud</em>, Harry thought as he tapped the bowl with the tip of the wand.</p><p> </p><p>Tanzaku Gai was smaller than he thought but so much busier than expected. Harry strolled in through the gates after a couple of hours observation from atop the town’s surrounding walls. This was probably what Mrs. Weasley would call a ‘den of iniquity’, he thought, eyeing what look like some sort of casino that blared its welcome through neon signs.</p><p>The air was heavy with a dizzying mix of alcohol, flowers and fast food. The stalls that lined the main street here were bigger, brighter and significantly more well-kept than the ones in the small village. People dressed like they were out for a spin at a muggle disco and Harry ducked into an alley to transfigure his clothes, shoes and glasses to match. It hadn’t been obvious from his observations just how bright their clothes would be up close.</p><p>“Hello, handsome! Fancy a turn?” said a woman up ahead, waving coyly to him when he passed. Harry hurried by with heat in his cheeks, pushing his bright purple glasses up his nose to hide the blush. Her laughter trailed after him on the wind.</p><p>“Won’t you try your luck, stranger? Only 500 ryo!” called a man leaning against a sign-post shaped like some kind of playing card. Harry shook his head, though he couldn’t quite deny his curiosity. For a wizard, gambling would be a better way to get coin quickly. And it would certainly make him feel less guilty than stealing from people.</p><p>“I told you, Shizune, I don’t care!” A blond woman clomped by, glaring behind her like she was about to unhinge her jaw and swallow her companion whole. Said companion was wearing the long-suffering look of someone used to dealing with toddler-level tantrums.</p><p>The inn they’d stepped out of looked pretty nice. There probably wouldn’t be any peeling wallpaper in there. <em>And hopefully no shinobi popping by to for a quick bout of murder</em>.</p><p>It would do, at least for the night. Shadows were deepening in the corners and Harry wanted a place to sleep before night fell. Some poison-less food wouldn’t go amiss either.</p><p>He booked one of the cheaper rooms they had available and stood blinking in confusion as the proprietor explained that <em>this establishment doesn’t tolerate any additional nightly guests, sir.</em> It took him until he was standing in the room before he realized what that meant. He had another opportunity to blush and took it.</p><p>Setting up the wards took only a few minutes. Ordering dinner took twice that long, because Harry hadn’t used a muggle phone in so long he mucked it up twice before punching in the numbers right. When he checked the dish there was nothing there but the expected ingredients. Butterflied grilled eel drizzled with soy sauce on a mound of steaming white rice.</p><p>Harry’s mouth watered.</p><p>He got halfway through the meal, struggling less with the chopsticks than expected, when a distant explosion made the walls tremble. Several paintings and an artfully arranged bouquet of flowers went sailing to the floor. The night outside lit up with screams and the sound of stampeding feet.</p><p>Harry glared at the door. <em>I don’t even get to finish the meal?</em></p><p>Apparently even new, untested dimensions were out to get him. It would be perfectly reasonable for him to just hightail out of there or even sit fuming in his room and finish his grilled fish. But people on the street outside were screaming and Harry was Gryffindor to the bone, so there was no part of him that could ignore it.</p><p>He stuck his head out a window and squinted up at the night sky. Then blinked, taking a moment to process the scene before him. There appeared to be a giant slug crushing a section of the town walls. That was pretty concerning. And also extremely weird.</p><p><em>It’s even bigger than the giant squid.</em> He pushed his glasses further up his nose, leaned over the windowsill and drew his wand slightly shakily. The chaos below made it harder to focus, with people running head over heels through billowing dust clouds kicked up by the partial destruction of the walls.</p><p>“Protego.” The shield went up like a sheet of silver before the slug, the flickering reflections of street lights below glinting along its surface.</p><p>More screams ruptured the night, the stampede growing worse. They seemed even more shocked by the shield than by the giant slug, which was also pretty weird. There was probably a clue in that somewhere, though Harry wasn’t sure what the clue was. That giant animals weren’t that uncommon here?</p><p>He sucked in a breath, Apparated onto a roof across from the inn and gawked up at the giant eyestalks outlined against the dark blue of the night sky. This close, the thing was the size of a small mountain and blocked out the sight of the partially wrecked walls around it. Shame he didn’t have the Firebolt with him.</p><p>“Depulso!” He flicked his wand with a sharp snap, but the slug’s body was like jello and where the spell hit, its white flesh only indented and rippled.</p><p><em>Sturdy and bigger than a dragon.</em> Harry cocked his head at the globes that formed the tips of the eyestalks, inspired by the sudden memory of his fight against the Horntail. <em>Worth a shot.</em></p><p>He slashed a Conjunctivitis curse at one of the creature’s eyes and flinched at the near-human screech of pain that resulted. Its tiny furl of a mouth stretched open and spat out a flurry of viscous yellow liquid. It didn’t stop screaming.</p><p><em>I didn’t know slugs had voices</em>, Harry thought, taking an involuntary step back. He hadn’t meant to cause that much pain.</p><p>“What do you think you’re doing, you little shitweasel?!” roared a tiny figure popping up atop the slug’s giant head.</p><p><em>Wait, the slug belongs to someone? </em>Harry raised his wand and then lowered it again, making and discarding several half-cocked plans in record time.</p><p>The figure crouched like a frog before a jump and propelled itself in a flying leap toward him. Adrenaline rushing like lightning in his veins, Harry enforced the Membrana shield and raised another <em>Protego</em> for good measure.</p><p>A fist impacted the shield and the force of it rippled outwards like rings across a pond surface.</p><p>Harry’s breath locked in his throat.</p><p><em>Thank Merlin for magic</em>. That punch would probably have caved his head in.</p><p>“Never seen a jutsu like that before,” said the figure, standing back to her full height. Blond hair, large chest, expression like a fuming bull before a matador.</p><p>“You’re one of those ‘kunoichi’ people?” Harry asked, hoping his voice came out smooth. Backed by the giant mollusk, feet planted firmly on the cracked roof tiles and with her fists glowing faintly, the woman made quite the picture. A picture of the death-by-woman-scorned variety. “Why are you trying to hurt the people of this town?”</p><p>He felt kind of ridiculous trying to sound all authoritative when he really just wanted to scream in her face and turn her head into a pumpkin. Harry tried to match the firmness of her stance.</p><p>“What? I’m saving Tanzaku from those damn Rock-nin!”</p><p>Oh. Uh. Crap? If this woman wasn’t the aggressor, then he probably looked like the bad guy of the situation. Though to be fair, her giant slug had crushed several buildings and the people running heedlessly around the streets below clearly didn’t feel like the slug was their savior.</p><p><em>And again with the ‘Rock-nin’.</em> <em>I need to find out why they seem to be a threat here in Fire country specifically.</em></p><p>“What Rock-nin?” Harry asked, focusing on his peripheral vision and trying to take in any other shinobi people in the area. All the nearby roofs seemed empty and he didn’t want to take his eyes away from the angry slug woman for a closer look.</p><p>“The ones currently crushed under Katsuyu,” she said, waving a hand at the slug.</p><p>“Oh.” Harry cocked his head. That was gross, terrifying and murderous. In other words, pretty on-brand with what he knew of shinobi so far. But if she wasn’t an enemy of Tanzaku Gai, he should probably stop hexing her oversized jello friend. “Sorry for attacking your slug, then. I thought you were trying to hurt the people here.”</p><p>The woman blinked, scrunching her nose like she wasn’t entirely with it. Then she bent over and threw up.</p><p>Harry stumbled back a step and wrinkled his nose at the alcohol-vomit combo splattering over the roof, torn between Apparating away and standing there in abject confusion. The latter seemed a more reasonable option now that the kunoichi was less murderous and more nauseous.</p><p>Harry let the <em>Protego</em> fall, eyed her for a second and then conjured a napkin that he soaked with a quick <em>Aguamenti</em>. He offered it to the woman, who snatched it out of his hand and glared at him.</p><p>“If you’re expecting a thank you, you’ll be waiting a long time. That I had to jump around like a toad after an all-nighter is your fault. And those damn Rock-nin…” She blinked and upon closer inspection her face was sort of flushed, like she was feverish.</p><p>“Uh. The blame lies more with the Rock-nin. I think? And you’re welcome for the napkin anyway.” Harry shrugged uncomfortably. Adrenaline was still coursing through him, his shoulders tight and spine tingling with an awareness of their surroundings. He hadn’t wanted a fight, but this was one hell of an anticlimactic ending.</p><p>“Tsunade-sama!” A young woman bounded up to the roof from the street, a clothed pig bouncing on her shoulder like a swaddled newborn. “Are you alright?”</p><p>The blond kunoichi hiccupped a little and then blew her nose into the napkin. “Fine. Fuhh—<em>iiine</em>.”</p><p>Oh. She was just drunk. <em>Really</em> drunk.</p><p>“I’m going to go –” Harry started and turned around. The younger black-haired woman wore a jumble of expressions somewhere between fury and worry. It triggered a slight inkling that he’d seen her somewhere before. “Uh, you’re okay now? Right? Or do you need any help?”</p><p>Fucking saving-people-thing. He cursed himself even as the words slipped out.</p><p>“No, we’re alright,” said the young woman, a look in her eyes like she expected Harry to go for her throat.</p><p>“Great.” When she partially turned around to tend to her companion, he pointed his wand-arm in the direction of the hunched-over blonde. A Sobering charm, coming right up. The twins had taught him that one.</p><p><em>Resipisco</em>.</p><p>The blonde stiffened. Then she was suddenly standing straight, napkin fluttering to the roof at her feet and with one of those little knives in hand.</p><p><em>Why didn’t I just Apparate away?</em> Harry wondered at himself. It was a very good rhetorical question, asked in what sounded an awful lot like Hermione’s voice.</p><p>“What the <em>hell</em> was that?”</p><p>“Nothing. Goodbye!” Harry said and turned on the spot. When up shit creek, turn on your heel and run from your problems. One of the twins had taught him that too, though he couldn’t remember which one.</p><p>He spotted a flash of her enraged expression before the tug of Apparition carried him back to his room. He charmed the curtains mostly shut and through a slip of space between them, he watched as the giant slug shuddered and turned into an equally giant cloud of smoke.</p><p><em>What-the-fuck-ever. Giant slugs turning into smoke. Why not?</em> Harry plopped down on the floor and angrily polished off the rest of his now cold grilled eel.</p><p>At least the kunoichi couldn’t follow him in here.</p><p>At the tail-end of that relieved thought, the door slammed open with the force of a muggle battering ram. Startling into a standing position, Harry flung the leftovers at the doorway and then blinked at the sight of the blonde with droplets of soy sauce all over her front. She looked even more like a bull now, steaming with outrage and clearly prepared to gore him.</p><p>“What the hell are you doing, brat?!”</p><p>Harry balked. “You just barged in here, lady!”</p><p>She stomped in and glared harder, her high-heeled sandals dragging mud across the carpet. “It took me half an hour to find you! If you didn’t want to be followed, you should have left!”</p><p>Harry gritted his teeth. That was actually a good point, but he’d wanted to angrily finish his meal.</p><p>She grinned with all her teeth showing. “I have some questions for you, kid. Let’s talk.”</p><p>Harry immediately Apparated out of Tanzaku Gai.</p><p> </p><p>He’d memorized an Apparition point on the outer side of the walls, just in case. It was a tucked-in corner behind a shed, out of sight and clearly rarely used. After landing, he took a moment to breathe in and out like a marathon runner after a race, trying to slow down the hammering of his heart against his ribcage.</p><p><em>What the hell. No really</em>, Harry thought more firmly. <em>What the actual hell?</em></p><p>This dimension sucked. It hadn’t even been a day, for Merlin’s sake.</p><p>“Do you need help?” asked a faint voice and Harry stumbled around with his wand-arm raised before he registered a concerned teenager’s face, partially obscured in shadow by the shed’s corner roofing. The darkness of the night was more compact here outside the town, with no lamps or lanterns to light the area.</p><p>“No, thank you,” he managed to grit out, throat full of gravel. He was either going to end up murdering someone or have a heart attack.</p><p>The stranger shrugged. “Your call. It’s what we’re here for, though,” he said and thumbed the metal plate on his forehead.</p><p>Harry’s stomach dropped. <em>Shit</em>, that was a hitaisomething! A shinobi whatsit! The thing they used to identify each other!</p><p>Harry took a step back and firmed his stance, then watched as the stranger’s stance shifted to match what he apparently viewed as hostility. It was a totally different posture than the dueling stances Harry was used to, but he could read the intention in it.</p><p>“Is something the matter?” the shinobi asked. His casual voice didn’t match his slightly bent knees.</p><p>Harry pretty much exploded. “I have had it up to here with you ‘shinobi’. All you do is pop out of nowhere and threaten people for no reason. Leave me <em>alone</em>.”</p><p>It had been a pretty stressful day. And it didn’t count as a freak-out when you were in somebody else’s face, calling them out on their bullshit and also slightly blaming them for the shit day you’d just had.</p><p>The stranger’s stance changed again, knees softening. “Shinobi aren’t supposed to mess with civilians.”</p><p>“Yeah? Your friends don’t seem to have gotten that memo.” Harry breathed out harshly. “I’m not joking. Leave me alone.”</p><p>“You can report it you know. To Hidden Leaf authorities.” His voice was softer now, like he was trying not to spook a wild foal. It made Harry grit his teeth. “Hidden Leaf takes a very dim view of its shinobi acting up on civilians.”</p><p>“The last thing I want is to end up in Asshole HQ, thanks and goodbye.” Harsher than he meant to be, but it felt right to say. Harry strode away from the teenager, rubbing the anger out of his eyes. He kept his attention behind him in case this new helpful shinobi was really just trying to help him into an early grave.</p><p>“I’m not joking,” the teen called behind him, voice growing fainter as Harry left him behind. “You can report it to the Konoha Military Police – tell them Uchiha Shisui sent you!”</p><p>Harry slowed his steps. Weren’t those Sharingan eyes an Uchiha thing?</p><p>Those Uchiha eyes that could create impossible illusions and kill you with a glance? That could rend apart space and time?</p><p>Those eyes the villagers said were rumored to have the ability to warp a person across dimensions?</p><p>Harry turned around. “So how do I get to Hidden Leaf?”</p><p>He’d report that some weirdo with poofy grey hair, a tiny murderer with no manners and a drunk with a giant slug for a pet were bullying civilians. That would give him the cover needed to investigate the truth of the rumors about the Sharingan.</p><p><em>But how likely is it that the Konoha Military Police will even recognize the descriptions of those three?</em> There were probably thousands of shinobi in Hidden Leaf and it wasn’t like the police could keep track of everyone. He had no real idea if shinobi could even be well-known in the traditional sense of the word, but he'd keep his fingers crossed that those three weren't some anonymous run-of-the-mill rank and file.</p><p>Ah, whatever. That was a problem for later, when he'd actually made it to the village. As Uchiha Shisui explained the path to Hidden Leaf, Harry was just happy to have gotten a solid lead. <em>Home sweet home, here I (eventually) come!</em></p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Harry's life is a soup made of 100 % certified mess u__u</p><p>Comments very welcome!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. rocknroll</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The path to Hidden Leaf was a damn mess, Harry concluded a few hours later. When Shisui had explained it, it had sounded pretty reasonable – take the long way around this area because of bandit activity, zigzag between these two mountain ranges, be careful crossing the river here and so on. Harry had Apparated through and around every obstacle he could, but he’d realized by the time sunrise started grasping at the horizon that the journey would take a couple of days at least.</p><p>Shisui had warned him to be especially careful of bandit attacks while traveling at night, telling him to rest up at inns along the way, and Harry had nodded along and then ignored all of that advice. As long as he cast <em>Homenum Revelio</em> at regular intervals, bandits wouldn’t be sneaking up on him any time soon.</p><p>Shisui had mentioned that he could follow the trade caravan tracks to navigate and so far that seemed to hold true. In places the grass was worn down from travel, in others deep mud had tracks of varying sizes slicing through it. It seemed odd for a hidden village to have so much open trade, but since the four-point charm he was relying on had fairly limited usefulness, Harry was thankful for it.</p><p>“<em>Point me</em>.” He laid his wand flat in his palm and waited for its point to spin north.</p><p>When he left the town, he’d dropped the Tanzaku Gai peacock attire and settled for something close to Shisui’s own clothes. Not the weird green vest or the terrible sandals that probably meant every one of these shinobi people were constantly walking around with gunk between their toes, but something like the dark undershirt and dark pants. They were plain enough and made blending into the background easier.</p><p>He kept on the path up north and watched with interest how the wildlife changed around him the further he traveled. Sparse trees and high grasses turned into deep woods broken up by the occasional field. It reminded him of the forest he’d met the tiny murderer in – something in the largeness of the trees, the denseness of the vegetation. Only the soft twittering of early morning birds and the warbling of fresh water broke the silence.</p><p>Then a body came flying out of the woods, because of course it did, and crash-landed in the little stream Harry had been planning to <em>Accio</em> some fish from. A deeper silence descended on the meadow as the birds took flight, their twittering melodies disappearing from the trees.</p><p>“Er, hello,” Harry said when the body poked its head up, having skipped past the why-does-this-keep-happening shock and landing on resigned acceptance. “Are you okay?”</p><p>“A civilian?” The voice was rough and gurgling.</p><p>“Yes,” Harry said, eyeballing the man as he wavered to his feet. The stream had pinkened with blood. “Do you need help?”</p><p>“Not from a fucking civilian,” said the man, which was pretty rude, and fell facedown into the ground beside the stream, which was unfortunate but not entirely undeserved.</p><p>“Okay, then.” Harry walked up to the man, casting <em>Homenum Revelio</em> as he went and crouching down beside him when no other human presences were revealed. In his thirties, brown hair, mesh pants, those stupid shinobi sandals and a hitai-thing with two stylized little blobs on tied around his leg.</p><p><em>I guess not all shinobi can be stand-outs appearance-wise</em>, Harry thought. The man was the human version of the color beige.</p><p>Harry cast the only diagnostic charm he knew. There was a good chance the spell missed a couple of injuries, but the man didn’t seem to be bleeding out. The charm gave Harry the impression that beyond the visible cuts and bruises, the man had some barrenness in him, like a vessel that should have been filled with water rattling empty instead.</p><p><em>Some kind of exhaustion?</em> he hazarded. <em>Or starvation?</em></p><p>Strange.</p><p><em>Well, I’ve wanted to try this for a while…</em> Harry leaned over the man’s chest and pointed the tip of the wand at the deepest gash. He exhaled explosively, a little uncomfortable. He wasn’t really using the man as a guinea pig – he’d practiced this on pieces of steak and on one of the Burrows’ garden gnomes. He could do this. He <em>would</em> do this.</p><p>“<em>Vulnera Sanentur</em>,” spilled out of his mouth in that low, crooning song that was the healing spell’s incantation. Before his inner eye, he saw the wounds heal. The magic had a crisp minty feel, like a blast of snowflakes flurrying up his back, and Harry watched breathlessly as the man’s flesh started to knit together. It was like watching an injury happen in reverse. Unbleeding the flesh. Unslicing the skin.</p><p>Success. He’d done it.</p><p>A not-insignificant part of Harry wanted to drum his feet against the ground in some impromptu hodgepodge little jig. He didn’t, but there was a heady rush of victory in him. Real healing magic was pretty damn difficult.</p><p>There was a whizzing sound, like something small whipping through the air.</p><p>Harry snapped his head to the side, blinking owlishly down at the little knife stuck several centimeters into the ground behind him. He turned around and the man was now crouched before him, armed to the teeth and eyes glittering with hostility.</p><p>“What do you want? What did you <em>do</em>?”</p><p>“Stopped you from dying,” Harry said, despairing at yet another murder acting snotty after getting help. Was it a pride thing? Or a shinobi-in-general thing?</p><p>“A Fire country civilian helping a Rock-nin,” the man said, voice going high and mocking. “So kind of you.”</p><p>“Merlin, you’re all a bunch of hopeless assholes, aren’t you?” Harry blinked at the man as owlishly as he’d blinked at the little knife. Well, at least he’d finally met one of these Rock people. He’d be able to add that mental souvenir to his collection of unwelcome shinobi encounters.</p><p>“The civilian has a mouth on him,” the Rock-nin said, the corners of his mouth twitching. Into a grin or into a scowl, Harry couldn’t tell. He eyed the man carefully, a twine band of nervousness winding around his bellybutton.</p><p>Suddenly it wasn’t just exasperating anymore. This man had murder in his head, cold fire in his eyes.</p><p>“Now you’re getting it, little civilian,” the man murmured. The condescension was as infuriating as the threat in the cant of the Rock-nin’s body. “Only toddlers are naïve enough to offer strange shinobi help.”</p><p>Harry abruptly remembered that tiny murderer’s suspicion, the scornful note in his questioning of Harry’s ‘altruistic assistance’. Maybe this place truly <em>was</em> so unfeeling that a young boy couldn’t count on assistance when surrounded by adults trying to kill him.</p><p>Harry’s nose crinkled at the thought and then coughed out a sharp breath, because two little knives were suddenly buried in his shin. It was less the pain that gave him pause but the suddenness of it, the realization that he didn’t have the time to pause for a second and think.</p><p>Because this man was trying to kill him.</p><p>And wasn’t that a familiar feeling?</p><p>“You did well not to offer me any tears,” said the man, nodding with something like respect. It made Harry want to punch him, because that was a level of condescension he’d never had directed at him before.</p><p>He twisted, pointed and thought <em>Stupify!</em> so hard his head echoed with the word. The man froze like the stilling of a magical photograph into a muggle photograph.</p><p>Then he crumpled into a heap.</p><p>And there sat Harry with two knives in his leg, his heart in his throat and the overwhelming feeling that it just wasn’t funny anymore. It really wasn’t. None of it. Not when he was alone. Not when Hermione wasn’t here to bonk him over the head and then kiss him on the cheek, not when Ron wasn’t here to go <em>blimey, mate</em> and exchange a wide-eyed look.</p><p>Harry wasn’t much for crying when people weren’t dying around him. He breathed in deeply, felt what he felt so deep it soaked into his bones, and got to work on his leg. Summoning the knives out hurt like a slash of fire through the muscle and he hacked a exhale that was half a sob.</p><p>Fucking <em>ouch</em>.</p><p>The first time he tried to heal the bleeding wounds, the spell came out in a frazzled streak of barely-there light. <em>I swear this usually doesn’t happen to me! </em>he heard Fred or George’s voice mock in that shrill parody of Percy’s voice they’d been fond of doing after Percy left to ally with the Ministry. <em>I swear it’s just been a long day – w-where are you going, Penelope?</em></p><p>Harry snorted a weak laugh to himself. Surprisingly, that helped settle him.</p><p>“<em>Vulnera Sanentur,</em>” he murmured again and the resulting sensation of healing flesh was kind of unpleasant, unnatural. A tightening spasm, a tugging of the skin and blossoming warmth deep in the muscle.</p><p>He rose to stand on the leg, leaning on it slowly and then more firmly when the movement didn't cause any sudden surge of pain. He’d have to look it over in a few hour to see that the healing was holding as it should, but this was alright for now.</p><p>Alright. Everything was alright.</p><p>It had to be.</p><p>He turned around and twitched back at the sight of a man watching him from the treeline a yard up ahead. He felt the corners of his mouth pull down but before he could decide what to cast, the man held his hands up into the air.</p><p><em>I guess some gestures are universal even across dimensions</em>, Harry thought, eyeing the man’s open palms. He was clearly a shinobi, so the gesture of apparent harmlessness didn’t mean much.</p><p>The new shinobi pointed at the downed man and Harry put the dots together. This new shinobi was obviously the reason for the Rock-nin’s injuries. Harry backed away, nape prickling with awareness and the urge to move. He could just Apparate away. He would, if the new shinobi so much as looked at him the wrong way.</p><p>“Good evening,” said the man when he was close enough to speak without raising his voice. Harry took quick stock of him. One of those hitai-things around his forehead, dark hair and beard, a sash tied above his thigh. The same flak jacket as Uchiha Shisui, Harry noted.</p><p>
  <em>Another Leaf shinobi?</em>
</p><p>“Good evening,” he returned carefully, not quite sure what to make of the man’s appearance. He had the same stylized leaf on his metal headband – which Harry now noted was a different symbol from what the downed man had on his hitai-thing.</p><p><em>So the headbands do note village affiliation</em>. Well, the downed man had called himself a ‘Rock-nin’ and Harry had come to understand very clearly that Leaf and Rock did not get along.</p><p>“Did he give you trouble?” the shinobi asked, glancing at the two bloody knives on the ground.</p><p>No point in lying with the evidence right there. “Yes, but then he sort of collapsed.”</p><p>Okay, so that was a small lie. Sort of. A lie by omission. But Harry was good at lying and kept a straight face.</p><p>“Blood loss,” said the man, shrugging. “I’m sorry if I frightened you by my sudden appearance. I didn’t think there’d be any civilians traveling this way at this time.”</p><p>That was clearly well-meant, but the soft tone was one used for baby lambs and made Harry itch with irritation. He plastered on a smile anyway. At least this shinobi wasn’t an alcoholic slug charmer or a hostile prick.</p><p>“It’s alright.” If he’d taken Shisui’s stern suggestion to rest in an inn along the way, he’d have avoided all this. No use crying over spilled milk, though.</p><p>“I’m Sarutobi Asuma, from Hidden Leaf.”</p><p>Harry thought for a moment. It wasn’t like he’d introduced himself to anybody in this dimension, so… “Harry Potter. From a tiny village down south.”</p><p>Had the hamlet even had a name? He couldn’t remember if he’d heard or read it anywhere during his brief time there.</p><p>Sarutobi shot him a half-smile. “At your service, Harry-san.”</p><p>Harry doubted that. But at least Sarutobi wasn’t trying to kill him and that made him a bit of a stand-out.</p><p>Sarutobi nodded towards the other shinobi. “I need to deal with him. You might want to look away.”</p><p>Harry had seen enough dead bodies to last him a lifetime, but he’d also used various fresh organs in potions class. He set his jaw and glared. <em>What, does he think I’m going to faint or something?</em></p><p>There was an amused twitch to the shinobi’s mouth. Harry glared harder. Supercilious jerk.</p><p>‘Dealing’ with the man involved breaking his neck with an efficient snap. No blood, no dismemberment. Harry was almost disappointed – he’d braced himself for little to nothing.</p><p>
  <em>He thought I’d need smelling salts at the sight of a neck-snap?</em>
</p><p>Okay, so it wasn’t fun to see the man’s neck dangle like rubber off his shoulders. But it wasn’t more than not-fun. It was nowhere near what he’d gotten used to in the wizarding world. He still glanced away as the man opened a big scroll, used a hand signal that looked sort of like sign language, and sucked the dead shinobi into it somehow.</p><p>The blue flare of power was unfamiliar, but the feeling of natural/unnatural mixed together was a bit similar to how magic felt. He wasn’t quite sure what to make of it.</p><p>“All done.” Sarutobi closed the scroll and stuffed it into a pocket. “Are you heading somewhere close by?”</p><p>Harry huffed. “I’m heading to Hidden Leaf to make a complaint.”</p><p>Sarutobi seemed to catch himself at those words. “A complaint?”</p><p>“Yes. Another shinobi recommended that I do so.” He tried going for a formal Hermione-esque tone, but couldn’t really shake the nerves.</p><p>“I wouldn’t mind the company back to the village.”</p><p>Sarutobi’s face was sort of unreadable and Harry really didn’t like that. He’d only ever started on the basics of Legilimency at Hermione’s insistence and then hadn’t really bothered practicing after that, so it wasn’t like he could skim the man’s thoughts to check his intentions.</p><p>“No thanks, I’m good.”</p><p>Sarutobi nodded, acquiescing a lot easier than expected. He didn’t charm a giant invertebrate to land on Harry’s head or anything and Harry could appreciate the man’s unusual level of restraint for a shinobi.</p><p>“I don’t like leaving a civilian to travel alone through the night.” Sarutobi scanned the treeline once and then turned back to stare Harry down.</p><p>Great. In the one moment where he was actually in need of a shinobi without too many scruples, he’d stumbled on one with a conscience. Harry’s appreciation went down a few notches and he smiled tightly.</p><p>“I’ll be fine. I got this far on my own. And I met an Uchiha shinobi who told me how to get to Hidden Leaf to make a complaint to Hidden Leaf’s police.” Mentioning a member of the famous clan should earn him some brownie points.</p><p>The man looked thoughtful. “Which Uchiha?”</p><p>“Uchiha Shisui.”</p><p>Sarutobi’s face cleared. “Shisui? I know him.”</p><p>Harry was pretty good at judging when people were lying to his face and Sarutobi didn’t seem like he was. Still, what were the odds of this one random shinobi incidentally knowing that particular random Uchiha shinobi? The Uchiha clan was supposed to be fairly large.</p><p>“Really.” He didn’t bother hiding the skepticism.</p><p>“Dark eyes, short dark hair, big nose, wears his hitai-ate around his forehead?”</p><p>Harry found himself sort of annoyed when the description was wholly accurate. He didn’t want to be stuck with one of Shisui’s shinobi friends or comrades or whatever the whole way to Hidden Leaf. The urge to Apparate away was overwhelming.</p><p>But instead he sighed. “Fine. You can show me the way to the police HQ, I guess.”</p><p>Trying too hard to push Sarutobi away would probably raise red flags at this point. Harry turned the thought over in his head. Did it really matter if Sarutobi came with him to Hidden Leaf, as long as he didn’t stalk Harry around after they’d reached the village? Even if he did, it wasn’t like Harry couldn’t just <em>poof</em> away with Apparition once they reached their destination.</p><p>Though if he did that, Sarutobi could raise some alarm that there was a foreigner sneaking around the village and then Harry wouldn’t be able to lay low and investigate the Sharingan rumors without transfiguring his appearance long-term.</p><p><em>Still, arriving in the village accompanied by one of their shinobi might legitimize my reasons for being there</em>, Harry thought and felt uncomfortably Slytherin. Hermione was the one who used words like ‘legitimize’ and plotted circles around people.</p><p>“If you’re ready to go…?” Sarutobi interrupted, sounding like was repeating himself.</p><p>Harry colored. Not the most subtle bout of scheming on his part, though the shinobi didn’t comment on his brief apparent woolgathering.</p><p>They made their way forward at a slow pace and it was kind of embarrassing to realize, hours later, that since shinobi were supposed to be really good at running around when out doing their killing business and whatnot, he was probably slowing Sarutobi down.</p><p>
  <em>I did witness that incredible speed first hand.</em>
</p><p>He tried not to linger on the thought of what shinobi actually did for a living. Or let his gaze seek the pocket with the scroll full of corpse-nin. It worked alright – Harry had long since learned how not to dwell on the bad stuff.</p><p>It helped that Sarutobi wasn’t a bad travel partner to have around. He shared his food and chitchatted about nothing with an ease Harry sort of envied. He’d never been much of a smooth talker.</p><p>“How long have you been on the road?”</p><p>“Uh --” Think, think, <em>think</em>. What was a normal civilian speed in this dimension? “Two days.”</p><p>The man slid him a quick look that made Harry’s stomach clench. “Did you ride with a trade caravan?”</p><p>Okay, so two days was obviously too quick. Harry kept a straight face.</p><p>“Yeah, yesterday.”</p><p>Sarutobi nodded and the conversation moved on, almost too easily. There were casual chats about Hidden Leaf’s upcoming festival, about the harvest fire down south, about the Tinzu shipping port closing. Harry tried to look like he recognized a lot more than he really did and tried even harder to absorb as much information as possible.</p><p>All in all, as day continued to wash the night away with every sunrise color, the journey was actually pretty nice. It calmed him down more than he’d thought it would just to have someone around. It made the road easier. Made it possible to fully appreciate the rocky landscape they were traveling through.</p><p>But Harry really shouldn’t have forgotten his <em>Homenum Revelio</em> routine. He should have cast it at least once an hour, just to be safe.</p><p>Because with all the grace of starving hyenas, three Rock shinobi dropped down from the overpass ahead just as they were passing through. It was about time for something to go wrong again, but this time he had nobody to blame but himself.</p><p>The immediate tension in Sarutobi caused a corresponding tightening in Harry’s back muscles.</p><p><em>Shit</em>, Harry thought, mostly because it’d be very hard to fight without revealing his magic to Sarutobi. And because there was no way he could Apparate away when the man couldn’t follow.</p><p>“Go,” Sarutobi said, lips pressed together. “They’re here for me.”</p><p>Harry was way too used to being the one everyone wanted to kill. It was kind of a nice change to have someone else be the hunted for once. Kind of nice to have the option not to be involved.</p><p>But despite what the Hat had once suggested, Harry was all Gryffindor. There was no way he’d leave the Leaf shinobi to face three Rock shinobi by himself. That went against everything Harry was. Even if running would be the better option. Even if his magic would end up being revealed in the ensuing chaos.</p><p>Because some things mattered more. Helping out where he could mattered. Repaying favor with favor mattered. Not letting people die for no reason mattered.</p><p>That last one mattered more than most other things, really.</p><p>Harry firmed his stance. “Nope!”</p><p>He popped his ‘P’ and everything. Sarutobi looked like he was sending a prayer up to the heavens for patience. Harry recognized the expression from how his Head of House had often looked when faced with the trio.</p><p>“Oh, we don’t mind the extra company…” said the largest of the Rock shinobi politely, tipping his hat like a true killer gentleman. “The more the merrier.”</p><p>Then he smiled, and his smile was an eerie, awful thing.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Dear bastard Rock-nin:<br/>really nagl, just fyi</p><p>Comments very welcome!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. spatter</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It had taken Harry years to understand the difference between <em>acting</em> and <em>reacting</em>. Even longer to understand how to take that difference into consideration in the split-second moment before green light lit someone up and sent them careening into death.</p><p><em>Reacting</em> was running to Sirius rescue after Kreacher’s mocking words, despite Hermione’s warnings. <em>Acting</em> was walking into the Forbidden Forest with the snitch in hand and his head held high.</p><p>Sarutobi turned to face the Rock-nin who had spoken to them, knees locked into a stance that showed a readiness to leap. The Rock-nin was turning to face him, that smile still in place.</p><p>And Harry knew he had roughly 0,5 seconds to decide what to do. To act instead of react.</p><p>He’d always been good at thinking on his feet and thank Merlin for that. He had to help. And he had to create a cover for himself. Clans – village – bloodlimits – Mistcivilwar – move<em>moveMOVE</em> –</p><p>And it was on. The smiling Rock-nin was flanked by an older kunoichi with teeth filed into sharp points and by a teenaged shinobi with a prosthetic leg. That was all Harry could take in before they disappeared.</p><p><em>That speed is fucking ridiculous</em>.</p><p>He kept his eyes on the way the dust and gravel moved beneath their feet. That was all that gave him the time to send the kunoichi flying back with a force of haphazard <em>Protego</em>. He tried to keep his teeth from gritting out of stress, to keep his eyes from going wide as he tried to take everything in, to narrow his focus only onto what mattered in the fight.</p><p>When the younger shinobi went to back up the kunoichi, Harry expanded the shield. The magic smashed them away and Harry risked a glance at Sarutobi. The man was fighting the smiling Rock-nin with his fingers curled into the knife version of brass knuckles, grim and firm in expression. Both of their movements were so fast their arms looked like scythes hacking through the air.</p><p>“Eyes on your own fight,” said the shinobi from somewhere much too close. Harry pulled in a startled breath and wavered on his feet. Almost stumbled back, <em>almost</em> let go of the shield. But despite his split-second inattention, the Protego held steady.</p><p>He poured more power into it and the shield coalesced into an opaque silver disk. The shinobi took a step to the side in a slash of movement that kicked up the gravel, and disappeared. Harry’s eyes twitched back and forth, trying to find him. The dust stirred behind his back and Harry turned to counter what he knew was coming.</p><p>The kunoichi bared her weaponized teeth in a wolfish snarl. “You’re no shinobi. But that jutsu –”</p><p>Harry didn’t give her time to finish the sentence. He dropped the shield, thought <em>Depulso!</em> and dove to the side to keep a hail of knives from turning him into a pincushion. The kunoichi was once again sent careening back, further this time, but the young shinobi had moved closer in the shadow of her attack. Watching and waiting for an opportunity.</p><p>Harry felt his own teeth pull back in a snarl. He cast another shield, let it go to move aside and got the fuck out of the way of a kick so sharp it could have passed for a cleaver. He Apparated behind the shinobi, breath in his throat –</p><p>And a knife pierced his shoulder. There was a piercing flare of pain, like fire in his flesh, and a brief ripple of tears that came and left his eyes – then another shield, another Apparition. Gritting his teeth as every movement jarred his injured shoulder and blinking the dampness away.</p><p>“What clan are you from, civilian?” asked the kunoichi like she wasn’t trying to kill him with another hail of tiny knives.</p><p>“None of your business,” Harry hissed through his teeth. But yes – that was it, that was the assumption he was counting on.</p><p>“Rock could use a talent like that. We pay better than Leaf, even to civilians,” she said and how unbothered she seemed made Harry’s snarl deeper. Her eyes were chips of dirty gray eyes in a face that suggested a life harshly lived. Probably younger than she looked. Probably more cold-blooded than she looked too. No room for pity or compassion here.</p><p>Harry took another breath and in a move as smooth as he could make it, dropped the shield, pointed and thought <em>Stupify</em>. He had the dark urge to cast something worse, something less – – but he didn’t, because that was a thing that mattered too. Not giving into dark urges.</p><p>She crumpled to the ground like a marionette with strings cut and then Harry suddenly had the teenage shinobi in his face, his expression a twisted sneer. This one was all fire, no ice. It was one of those irrelevant thoughts that sometimes cropped up in the middle of urgent trying-not-to-die business.</p><p>“You Leaf <em>filth</em>,” the shinobi breathed and pulled a sword from somewhere. It seemed like it just appeared out of thin air, but it was there and it was an immediate threat, so he’d ponder the particulars later.</p><p><em>“</em>Arresto momentum,” Harry murmured and it froze mid-swing. The shinobi didn’t, dropping the weapon and readying scarred fists. Harry repeated the spell, surprised that it had worked so well despite his inexperience. But he always learned best under pressure.</p><p>He prepared to cast again. Only adrenaline kept the fiery pain in his shoulder at bay.</p><p>And Sarutobi was suddenly right <em>there</em>, moving under and in like a streak of color. One of those knuckle-blades slashed out and up. A red line appeared across the shinobi’s throat and the resulting fountain all but propelled the teen back, stumbling gracelessly over his own legs.</p><p>Harry wasn’t squeamish, but he took half a second to look away. When he looked back, the shinobi’s eyes were half-open and his mouth slack.</p><p>“Are you alright?” Sarutobi’s voice, tone measured.</p><p>“Yeah.” It was mostly true. Or, well, somewhat. Harry glanced down at his shoulder and found his clothes empty of blood. His skin felt sticky underneath, though.</p><p>“Are you a shinobi?” Sarutobi asked, gaze fixed on the old kunoichi’s crumpled form. The question lacked any hint of accusation, but Harry still tensed.</p><p>“No,” he said and shifted on his feet. It was one thing to have a plan and another to put that plan into action. He only really had a strong suspicion about how all this bloodlimit business worked, no hard facts. “I can do some things though.”</p><p>“Yes, I noticed.” Sarutobi’s voice was dry, calm and put Harry at ease. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard of a clan with the abilities you displayed.”</p><p>Just faint curiosity. That calmed Harry’s nerves further. He hadn’t realized until just now how prepared he’d still been for Sarutobi to turn on him, act like almost every other shinobi had so far.</p><p>“It was just me and my parents. No real clan. Or not for a long time at least.” A lie always worked better when it was based in truth, that was something Harry had learned at Privet Drive. “We were from an island originally.”</p><p>He watched with hawk eyes how Sarutobi absorbed the information and wished badly for the ability to Legilimize the man. His body language was expressively neutral in a way that conveyed no relevant information.</p><p><em>Probably a shinobi thing, that,</em> Harry thought, a little jittery.</p><p>“Hidden Mist?” the shinobi asked finally and when Harry tensed this time, it was with a relieved breath caught in his chest. Whatever gods had once cursed him to live an interesting life finally saw fit to let things go a little right, just this once.</p><p>“I’m not going back to – Water country,” Harry said before the man could ask about it, trying to pretend he hadn’t just mentally stumbled over the name. But Sarutobi looked faintly amused.</p><p>“I didn’t think you were,” he said slowly. “A clan civilian would have good reason to stay away, I would imagine.”</p><p>The last bit was added quietly, compassionately and Harry felt moisture rise anew to line his eyes. Damn it, damn everything. But it was the first time anyone here had shown him uncomplicated human kindness and Harry wanted so badly to lean into that, just for a moment.</p><p>Though Harry wasn’t so naïve he didn’t realize that the kindness could be a trap.</p><p>The moisture fled and Harry cleared his throat, going for a casual shrug and failing. There was a rock in his throat that just wouldn’t ease up. Both from the emotional moment and the physical pain that took a stronger hold as the adrenaline faded.</p><p>“Your parents?”</p><p>“Dead.” Blunt. He was used to the thought of orphanhood, at least. “For a long time now.”</p><p>“I’m very sorry.”</p><p>Damn him, he still sounded sincere. Harry considered turning him into a cuttlefish and dumping him into some nearby body of water. If that sincerity was fake, was a trap to snare him, he really would do that. Because it was <em>working</em>. If it was a trap, Harry was letting it snap shut around him, letting himself believe in Sarutobi’s apparent sincerity.</p><p>“Do you still wish to come to Konoha and state your complaint?”</p><p>Harry looked him up and down in a quick glance. “I’m surprised you’re not threatening to kill me if I don’t come with you.”</p><p>There was a pause. “I’m not a Mist shinobi. Or a Cloud shinobi.”</p><p>Harry knew very little about Cloud, so he nodded and pretended to understand why that statement was supposed to be reassuring. The way the hamlet’s people had spoken of Leaf-nin had made them seem less aggressive than Rock-nin, but considering that Leaf was Fire country’s shinobi base, that didn’t necessarily mean much.</p><p>“You can make your complaint and then leave, if you wish.”</p><p><em>Is that actually true? </em>Harry tried to read the answer in those tanned features and was met with that same stone wall of neutral expression.</p><p>“Or you can stay for a while, if you wish,” he said and <em>there</em> it was. There was the sign that this whole thing wasn’t just a shinobi with a heart of gold popping out of the woodwork like some saintly jack-in-the-box, but a side of practical mercenary reasoning behind the kindness.</p><p>Harry was almost satisfied, but in a way that made something squirm unhappily in his stomach.</p><p><em>You </em>would<em> make a good cuttlefish</em>, he thought. Well, whatever. He needed to get to Leaf regardless. Though revealing some of his magic and hinging it all on a slapdash bloodlimit pretense left him on fragile, uncertain ground, it was better than nothing.</p><p>“I don’t trust shinobi,” Harry said bluntly. “I don’t think Leaf will be to my taste.”</p><p>He said it mostly to see what type of response he’d get. A neutral shrug was all and then Sarutobi lit a cigarette. It was almost too casual, and Harry thought even harder that the man really would make a good cuttlefish or maybe a little hermit crab.</p><p>“I thought you killed her, but that’s not it,” Sarutobi said, taking a drag. It took Harry a moment to realize that he was speaking of the kunoichi and even longer to turn around and stare.</p><p>There was a lot of blood. Thank Merlin the air still held a chill, otherwise the smell from the shinobi’s body would have been – massacre-like. Probably. Harry shied away from the thought and focused his gaze back on the Leaf-nin instead.</p><p>“No, I just sort of stilled her.” He’d read the theory behind the spell way back in first year and then promptly put it out of mind. In hindsight that hadn’t been a great move on his part.</p><p>“A very useful ability.” Sarutobi took another drag, bouncing the butt of the cigarette against his bottom lip in apparent deep thought. “And the shield?”</p><p>“An even more useful ability,” Harry said tartly. The man laughed, which wasn’t quite the reaction he’d expected as a response to the open deflection.</p><p>“You’re a strong kid.”</p><p>He did want to glare, thought about it and then gave it a go. He’d hit his majority last year and as a seventeen year old wizard, he was considered an adult. <em>So there.</em></p><p>The thought must have been reflected in his expression, because Sarutobi barked a deeper laugh. A flush crept up Harry’s neck to warm his ears and his glare became something more real. He was an adult. Had been an adult formally for a while now, and informally for a fair bit longer than that.</p><p>“To Leaf then?”</p><p>It would be childish to say something contrary just for the hell of it. That wasn’t what an adult wizard did. An adult wizard would give a nonchalant nod and not kick a taller, thicker, faster murderer-for-hire in the shin.</p><p>“Fast reflexes too,” said Sarutobi when Harry kicked him firmly in the shin.</p><p>The Leaf-nin turned away to deal with the dead shinobi’s body, which sobered Harry right up. He barely held himself back from pinching his nose shut at the smell that was now fully permeating the air. Blood had soaked into the ground dirt and was starting to coagulate at the edges.</p><p>“How long will your jutsu hold her?” the man asked when he was done packing up the corpse. He pushed at the woman with the tip of his terribly appointed open-toed sandals. Harry squinted and tried not to frown. Yeah, that was definitely blood spatter on the toes. Ugh.</p><p>“Several hours,” he answered absently. He’d used the stunning spell so often that he knew it inside and out. It was kind of incredible that they learned so useful a spell so early into their Hogwarts careers.</p><p>Sarutobi whistled. “Make that <em>very</em> useful.”</p><p>Oh no. Didn’t the man sound just a little too impressed? It hadn’t even occurred to Harry to lie about that.</p><p><em>What are the odds that he goes running to the head of the village about this fancy new bloodlimit that’s just appeared out of nowhere?</em> Harry thought and bit the inside of his cheek. The moment the thought occurred to him, the more inevitable a consequence it seemed. Too late to take back now, though.</p><p>He patched up his shoulder as well as he could with nothing but a discrete non-verbal Episkey and watched as Sarutobi packed the kunoichi into a different type of scroll, one covered in a more comprehensive network of little ink symbols he couldn’t read. That probably meant it wasn’t written in the same squiggly language of this world that Harry could somehow read.</p><p><em>There’s still time to turn him into something with gills!</em> cried a strident voice from the back of his mind. <em>Or to pull a fake-Moody and turn him into an amazing bouncing ferret!</em></p><p>“Alright. Let’s continue.”</p><p>Harry nodded automatically. The window of opportunity for an impromptu transfiguration seemed to have passed.</p><p>Sarutobi looked at him for a long moment and Harry wondered what he saw. The unease grew and threatened to show on his face, so he started walking in the direction the shinobi had indicated.</p><p>The Leaf-nin didn’t ask him any of the follow-up questions Harry had been expecting. Instead the man kept easy chatter going as they walked, anecdotes about daily life in Hidden Leaf and little stories about weird missions he’d been on. That made it easy to forget that he’d just slit a man’s throat and that he was carrying a magically paralyzed kunoichi in a pocket. It was like he just shrugged it off, which in turn meant that Harry found it easier to shrug it off as well.</p><p>The last vestiges of adrenaline leaving his system left him tired and kind of slumped. That was probably why it took him so long to realize that Sarutobi didn’t look quite right. His easy chatter stayed constant but got slower over time, like he was growing absent-minded. It wasn’t until Harry noticed a faint scent of blood, long after they’d left the fight behind, that a suspicion caught hold. He observed the shinobi from the corner of his eye as subtly as he could. Which, as Sarutobi turned to face Harry fully with both brows faintly raised, obviously wasn’t subtle enough.</p><p>“Er,” Harry started, a little wobbly in thought still. “Are you, uh, okay? You look –” <em>like shit</em>, he thought but didn’t say. With Sarutobi facing him head-on, the pallor to the man’s skin was obvious. It stood out especially starkly against the deep brown of his beard.</p><p>“The fight left me with some injuries –”</p><p>And Harry immediately felt his temper ignite.</p><p>“What.” It wasn’t even a question, it was an outraged statement. “You’re injured and didn’t say anything even though I was right here?!”</p><p>Harry definitely wasn’t a hypocrite, because reasons.</p><p>Sarutobi blinked, opened his mouth and then his lips curled into an expression of gentle amusement. “What could a civilian do to treat kunai injuries?”</p><p><em>I could have healed you.</em> Only, he couldn’t say that because he didn’t want to reveal that his ‘bloodlimit’ was absurdly flexible. Still, he could have conjured some bandages into his mokeskin bag or something.</p><p>Harry set his mouth into a stubborn line. “Did you treat it at all?”</p><p>No wonder Madame Pomfrey had always been so lacking in patience. Harry felt the spirit of the old healer take hold of him and prepared to argue his case.</p><p>“Let me see.”</p><p>“I’ll survive a couple of stab wounds.” The man looked more amused. He also looked paler.</p><p>“<em>Show me</em>. I have bandages in my bag. I can help.” Frustration made him consider simply stunning the man and then treating him, permission or no. He wasn’t going to let one of the few people who’d bothered to be kind to him just die.</p><p>“Alright.” Sarutobi pulled up his shirt and Harry’s lips went tense at the sight. The man had stuffed some kind of pale goo into the wounds and they weren’t actively bleeding, but they looked bad. Painful.</p><p><em>Those little knives are like ten centimeters. At least</em>. His wounds were definitely worse than Harry’s own.</p><p>Harry stuffed his wand-hand up to the wrist into the mokeskin bag and conjured a bandage, though he wasn’t sure how much it would help. The two stab wounds he could see were right above the hip bone, so he’d have to wrap the bandage around the shinobi’s body and that wouldn’t put enough pressure on it. But he pulled on the bandage until the whole thing was out and almost ripped it in his haste. Because doing little was better than doing nothing.</p><p>“Hey. It’s alright.”</p><p>Harry blinked up at the man, his worried thoughts slowing.</p><p>“I’m not dying,” Sarutobi said, a big hand closing gently around Harry’s arm. He was even paler now. “We’re close enough to Leaf now that I decided to pack the wounds with antibiotic ointment after assessing the damage. The Leaf medics can heal them. It’s going to be alright.”</p><p>Then his eyes rolled up into his head and he collapsed like a sack of potatoes.</p><p>Harry stared. <em>What</em>. That wasn’t fair! Sarutobi had sounded so calm and comforting and Harry had <em>felt</em> his pulse slow to less panicky levels.</p><p>Stumbling into a crouch by the man, he tried to ignore the somersaults his heart was doing in his chest. He cast the basic diagnostic charm and watched as the man’s wounds swirled with an image of messy dark colors that Harry was pretty sure indicated poison. There were also some frazzled staticky hues that pointed to instability in several of the man’s vitals. Apparently Harry wasn’t the only person the universe was out to get.</p><p>Okay. <em>Okay.</em> That he knew less than nothing about poison removal was unfortunate and that he didn’t have any bezoars conveniently stuffed into his mokeskin pouch even more so. He couldn’t even close the wounds with the poison still coursing through the man’s bloodstream. So improvisation was really the only course here. Harry was usually for improvisation, but not generally on people. He took one minute to think and another thirty seconds to waffle over the decided course of action.</p><p><em>I could</em> – He raised his wand-hand, hesitated and then went through with it. Because no better idea popped into his head and he didn’t know how bad the poison was, how quickly he needed to act.</p><p>“Accio poison,” he said on a hopeful breath. He repeated the spell more firmly when a bubble of thin liquid squeezed itself through the ointment goo and swirled out towards him.</p><p><em>Fuck yes</em>. It was a sentiment of pure relief.</p><p>Harry knew getting attached to people too easily was dangerous. He knew that. So he’d try his best not to care too much if Sarutobi died despite Harry’s best efforts.</p><p>He bit his lip so hard his mouth filled with the taste of new coins.</p><p>Then he repeated the spell until no more of the thin liquid emerged. Casting his mind back to lessons that seemed a lifetime away, Harry tried to recall how well the summoning charm worked on liquids or on flesh. There had been something about the difficulty of separating enmeshed material from one another? Or something like that. He faintly remembered how professor Flitwick had them try to summon chips of ice from glasses of water and how difficult that had been. And then later, how impossible summoning the water from a glass of orange juice was —</p><p>His thoughts were wandering, a little exhausted from the repeated adrenaline surges over the course of the day. He’d done what he could. He’d have to hope that it was enough.</p><p><em>I should probably find someplace safe to wait it out, see if he comes to</em>. Harry eyed the man and cast Mobilicorpus with a flick of his wand. Sarutobi rose into the air and Harry could push his floating body ahead of himself at waist height.</p><p>The rocky outcroppings of the landscapes offered plenty of hiding places and many convenient look-out points. He picked a half-cave indentation to settle into and cast every warding charm he knew to protect the little nook. Then he turned back to Sarutobi and made another attempt to draw out more poison, just in case, trying to broaden the scope of the spell to encompass the man’s whole body.</p><p>He willed it to work, and it did. Maybe it was the desperation itself, maybe it was his skills improving under pressure. Harry didn’t care either way, because when he cast the diagnostic charm again, Sarutobi’s body was nearly free of those dark, poisonous hues. His vitals were stabilizing, his face regaining a hint of color.</p><p><em>Thank Merlin</em>, thought Harry, all but collapsing at the man’s side. <em>Thank</em> <em>Merlin it worked</em>.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Harry, you lil fucking BAMF.</p><p>Next chapter will probably include another outsider POV. Harry has made quite the impression so far ;)</p><p>Comments very welcome!</p><p>EDIT: Sorry for the edit, I just really want to give my heartfelt congrats to the US. I hope the next four years are less... yeah. Good luck! &lt;3</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. foliage</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Asuma woke slowly, his awareness cracking through the mental fog with difficulty before being startled into full consciousness by instinct and experience. He didn’t move a muscle, assessing both his physical situation and the new surroundings with wary attention. The scent of gravel dust, hard ground beneath him, the sound of another person breathing close by. The memories only struggled through the surface with forceful insistence on his part.</p><p>The Rock-nin team. The civilian. The fight. The realization, in the middle of a sentence, that he was fading fast. That he’d underestimated jounin Anbā and overestimated himself.</p><p><em>Civilians are an odd breed</em>, Asuma reflected. He watched from below his lashes as the teenage boy puttered around the little cranny he’d made them a temporary shelter in. Asuma had noticed the draining of his energy, but had thought it a side-effect of chakra exhaustion. He should have considered poison. Hindsight was always 20-20, but he excused the mistake to himself by the knowledge that Rock-nin poisoners were so rare as to be close to an oxymoron.</p><p><em>What a glorious cockup.</em> His head pulsed with the drumbeat of an exhaustion headache and he badly wanted a cigarette.</p><p>This was exactly the sort of mistake that would have his father’s expression setting into lines of displeasure. Then would come a lecture on arrogance Asuma didn’t need, both because he was always acutely aware of his own mistakes and because he’d heard variations of that lecture several times a year since he made genin. Hiruzen’s nickname, ‘the Professor’, was well-earned for more than one reason.</p><p>He hadn’t managed to send a message to the temple to explain his absence to the Guardians there. Messaging Leaf was one thing, but the village and the temple had entirely different communication grids and he hadn’t wanted to risk the civilian becoming more suspicious than he already was. That yellow alert had only just made the rounds and he’d had no backup to call on, as it demanded.</p><p><em>Though it seems a little excessive</em>, Asuma thought, blowing out a soft breath through his nose. The alert had been sparse in a way that suggested secrets were being kept from up top, but the boy’s bloodlimit had largely clarified the reason for the secrecy. That was the sort of information they didn’t want getting out, not until the civilian had been evaluated and processed.</p><p>Bloodlimits were worth their weight in both gold and blood.</p><p>He hadn’t moved his chats with the civilian from the interview stage to the interrogation stage – or even from the casual interview stage to the invasive interview stage. The teen responded reasonably well to light questioning and Asuma wasn’t interested in derailing that by attempting something an Intel agent could do far better. Interrogation was reserved for hostile targets, but Intel had interviewers who would have you happily offering up your spleen for inspection and believe it was your idea to do so.</p><p><em>Let’s hope this abrupt side-track is worth it</em>, Asuma thought with a mental sigh. He’d managed to avoid Leaf for years now by sticking exclusively to Guardian missions with the monks and now this shit dropped into his lap. But his father would be happy to have him back, in that distant tactical way of his.</p><p>Asuma didn’t realize a frown had broken through at the thought of the old man until the civilian stepped closer. Behind closed lids he saw the shadow cross his face as the teen leaned over him.</p><p>“Sarutobi?”</p><p><em>Too late now.</em> He cracked open an eye and peered up at the boy.</p><p>“You’re awake,” the teen said, sitting back on his haunches with bright and obvious relief painted on his features. It was difficult to say how old he was, even up close. Maybe fifteen?</p><p>“Yeah,” Asuma said, his voice a dry whistle in his throat. Fuck, the poison had already done a number on him. But he wasn’t dead yet, so it was likely only a paralyzing agent. Couldn’t even have been a strong one, since by the positioning of the sun in the sky, it hadn’t put him down for too long.</p><p>“We’re in a half-cave-thingy in the place where you passed out,” said Harry unprompted. “Or close by where you passed out. There’s nobody around.”</p><p>As embarrassing it was to have collapsed in the middle of escorting a civilian, Asuma spared a moment to be impressed that the teen had been able to drag him all the way here. It was a solid choice of hiding place, so clearly the teen had a good head on his shoulders. That aside, a civilian would have no way to know if there really was ‘nobody around’. Asuma would have to do his own perimeter sweep to ascertain the truth of that.</p><p>“Good job,” he said, trying for a soothing tone despite the gravel in his throat. But instead of smiling or looking proud, the teen’s features twisted with annoyance.</p><p>“Yes,” he said and went to help Asuma sit up without waiting for any further reply. Asuma wasn’t sure what to make of it, but the teen’s pique didn’t hold for more than a couple of seconds and he put it out of mind.</p><p>Harry’s gaze flicked up to the sky. “There are dark clouds rolling in from the east.”</p><p>“Alright.” Asuma rolled his shoulders, his spine popping at the movement. A little rain wouldn’t kill them.</p><p>“Here, some water… You were only out for half an hour, but the air here is pretty dusty,” Harry mumbled, holding a waterskin to Asuma’s mouth. The water sloshed over his lips before he could think to check its contents, but testing for harmful agents would be excessive at this point regardless. If the teen wanted him dead, he could have accomplished that in the time Asuma was out cold.</p><p>“You had water with you?” he asked after a few gulps. He couldn’t remember seeing the teen drink anything Asuma hadn’t shared with him in the time they’d been traveling together. Harry shot him an unreadable look and rolled his eyes, then took a couple of long pulls of water himself.</p><p><em>Probably teenage pride</em>, Asuma thought, amused.</p><p>“How do you feel?”</p><p>Asuma tested his joints, muscle strength and cognition. There didn’t seem to be any adverse effects of whatever jounin Anbā had dosed him with. A strange but welcome surprise. Perhaps the man had hoped to take him alive.</p><p>“I’m good, thanks to your excellent care.” Laying it on a bit thick perhaps, but this time when the teen rolled his eyes it was with a half-smile.</p><p>“Yes, that’s right. All hail my excellent care.” Harry’s smile took on a half-crooked upturn that Asuma wasn’t sure how to interpret. Maybe he should ease up on the charm offensive.</p><p>“We’re close to Leaf,” he said and had a feeling that he’d already mentioned that at some point. Harry made an agreeing sound.</p><p>“I spotted people in the distance,” he said and tipped more water into Asuma’s mouth. “They were dressed like you, so I figured they were Leaf shinobi, but I didn’t want to risk calling out to them in case they were from some other village.”</p><p><em>In case they were Rock-nin</em>, Asuma heard in Harry’s words. Caution was a rational course of action after everything the kid had seen in the past few days. As a civilian he wouldn’t know much about death and suffering, but he’d taken everything well so far. Perhaps his upbringing had seen to that.</p><p><em>Speaking of his upbringing, what kind of clan name is ‘Harry’?</em> It didn’t sound like a typical Water country name. Though perhaps his clan had been scattered to the wind, and only Potter and his deceased parents carried the name.</p><p>“They were probably Leaf-nin,” Asuma said, letting none of his thoughts show on his face. “The other villages have slightly different basic uniforms.”</p><p>Harry nodded. “Do you want to start moving?”</p><p>“Might as well,” Asuma said and let the teen help him stand. He tested his stance, the shifting of the muscles in his back and legs, but felt no sudden weaknesses. Good.</p><p>They made their way out into the rocky crevasses and Asuma stood squinting up at the sky for a long moment. As dark as the deep ocean with a storm riding in on the horizon. It was that time of the year, he supposed.</p><p>“Yes, the sky is amazingly enough <em>still there</em>,” Harry said and Asuma turned his gaze to the teen, who was frowning at him from several paces away. “I bet the sky will still be there when we reach Leaf and open to even more admiration from underneath a roof.”</p><p>Asuma snorted quietly, lips tugging into an involuntary half-smile. There were shinobi who wouldn’t speak to a jounin so casually, and here was a civilian getting snappy at the drop of a hat. The teen hadn’t even bothered waiting, stomping ahead with irritated steps.</p><p>Asuma caught up to him and they walked in easy silence for a while, their rocky surroundings slowly being replaced by Hashirama-grown forest. The clouds were growing darker overhead, taking on a thunderous appearance accompanied by petrichor rising from the earth. They might not make it to Leaf before rainfall, but there were worse things than getting a little wet.</p><p>Home was beckoning.</p><p> </p><p>Harry watched Sarutobi the whole way left to Leaf, just to make sure the man was truly alright. But he’d clearly gotten rid of enough poison to leave the man not just alive, but healthy. Or at least as healthy as he’d been before the fight with the Rock-nin. The fact that poison could be drawn out with Accio was a relief and an unexpected boon. If shinobi used poisons regularly, the spell would definitely come in handy again.</p><p>“Leaf is just up ahead,” Sarutobi said and Harry left those thoughts in the back of his mind to look where the man was pointing. Far in the distance amber walls rose out of the woods, stretching wide and fading into the distance on both sides. Its outline suggested that at least this part of the village was rounded in shape.</p><p>“It’s big!” He didn’t mean to sound so surprised, but he’d expected something a little closer to Hogsmeade than Tanzaku Gai in size.</p><p>“Leaf is the largest hidden village in the Five Countries,” Asuma said and by the slight shift in his tone, Harry wondered if that was one of those things he was supposed to know. Too late to backtrack now, though.</p><p>“How many people live there?”</p><p>Asuma shrugged. “Tens of thousands.”</p><p><em>That’s pretty vague… probably on purpose, </em>Harry suspected. He gave the man a quick glance but let the topic go. There were spells to count the number of humans in a given area, though he couldn’t quite remember them on the spot. Eh, it would come back to him.</p><p>When the open gates of Hidden Leaf finally came into view, Harry was at first slightly underwhelmed. They were about as big as the ones in Tanzaku Gai, made of pale green wood and kind of old-timey in a way he could appreciate. The wizarding world had a similar historic feel, though obviously more western than eastern. He peered up at the squiggly red writing on the gates and wondered if it was directly analogous to Japanese or Mandarin or some other language that existed in his own dimension.</p><p>He turned to ask if the meaning of the squiggly letters, “hidden”, was something that all the villages had. It seemed a little ironic for a village that was supposed to be secretive. Then again, so did the gates standing open for anyone to come right in.</p><p>Something about the look in Sarutobi’s eyes stopped him before he could get the question out. The man had shared so many fun anecdotes about Leaf as they walked and those anecdotes didn’t match the current tightness around his eyes, the lines deepening between his brows.</p><p>“Uh, are you okay?” Harry ventured. The man immediately snapped out of whatever dark mood had struck him, but in a way that seemed entirely forced.</p><p>“Yes. It’s been a while since I was last here, that’s all.”</p><p>Harry had sort of gathered that, because all the stories Sarutobi had told involved him as a teen or a boy. But he’d thought the man had been away on a long mission, not that he’d left his village for some unhappy personal reason.</p><p>He shifted on his feet, that thought twisting in his mind. “Do you want to wait for a while? I mean, we don’t have to go in right away. Or at all, if you don’t want to. If you tell me where to find the police HQ –”</p><p>Sarutobi started chuckling midway through his ramble and Harry cut himself off to glare. The man seemed a moment’s away from laughing outright and it took real effort not to direct a Trip Jinx at his feet. He was being <em>sincere</em>. Sarutobi shouldn’t have to go in if he didn’t want to just to escort Harry to where he needed to be.</p><p>“You’re something else, you know that?” Sarutobi was still smiling, but the expression didn’t seem mocking. Harry wasn’t sure what to make of it. Sort of bright and calm, the tension seeping out of his face until the tightness in his expression was entirely smoothed away.</p><p>“Uh-huh. Well, at least you look less like you want to set the gates on fire,” Harry muttered and Sarutobi seemed surprised for a moment before his smile returned. He produced a cigarette from his pocket and stuck it between his lips, then waved Harry on.</p><p>“We just need to report our presence to the guards,” he said, gesturing towards a wooden stall sitting to the left on the other side of the gates. Two bored shinobi were manning it, lounging in the stall’s shadowed interior like cats on the verge of napping. The moment they spotted Sarutobi waving at them, they did an identical double-take and started grinning.</p><p><em>At least he has friends here</em>, Harry thought, sneaking a glance at Sarutobi’s deepening smile. Here were people he was clearly happy to see.</p><p>“Asuma!” One of the guards vaulted over the stall’s half-wall and bounded over, clapping Sarutobi on the back the moment he was close enough to reach him. “How many years has it been? Nevermind, aren’t you early? I thought you weren’t due back for a long while yet –”</p><p>“Hello, motor-mouth. I see some things haven’t changed at all in my absence.” Sarutobi turned to Harry, rolling the cigarette from one corner of his mouth to the other.</p><p>“This is Kamizuki Izumo.”</p><p>“Hello,” Harry said and was met with a bright grin from beneath a floppy fringe. Kamizuki was much shorter than Sarutobi and up close, definitely younger. Probably closer in age to Harry than to his returnee shinobi friend.</p><p>“Did you pick up a stray at the temple, Asuma?” he said, his eyes still locked onto Harry. Though the teen’s gaze stayed put, there was the sense that he was being looked over and critically evaluated.</p><p>Well, fine. Two could play that game. Harry’s gaze did the same kind of sweep, but he didn’t bother trying to make his evaluation subtle. Bloody rude shinobi, the whole lot of them.</p><p>“Less a stray and more a runaway,” Sarutobi said, rummaging around in his pocket and handing his younger friend a slip of paper. Kamizuki’s gaze finally dropped away to catch at whatever was written on the paper.</p><p>There was a moment of something in the air. One of those times Harry’s instincts told him there was trouble brewing just beneath the surface. His skin prickled in warning, but nothing actually happened. Kamizuki rolled up the paper and stuck it in one of his vest pockets, continuing to chat with Sarutobi with barely a pause. He even included Harry in the conversation, directing light questions and teasing his way.</p><p>Harry’s skin didn’t stop pricking.</p><p>Thank Merlin for the wand still attached to his arm, because something wasn’t right all of a sudden. There was some kind of threat or an issue that needed his attention, a change in the air Harry couldn’t quite read but that clearly <em>meant</em> something. Harry hadn’t survived this long by ignoring his instincts. He discreetly reinforced the Membrana shield and made himself breathe calmly and join in the conversation.</p><p>The other guard wandered over, hands hooked behind his neck. “I can’t believe you let a civilian get caught up in your fight, Asuma. That’s weak, man.”</p><p><em>Good hearing</em>, Harry thought, then wondered if that was natural or if it was a shinobi technique. He’d have to remember to use sound-muffling spells when needed.</p><p>“I got myself caught up in it,” he said with a shrug before Sarutobi could reply. “Those Rock-nin weren’t very nice.”</p><p>The other guard snorted. “They’re a bunch of assholes, yeah. I’m Hagane Kotetsu, the genius to Izumo’s idiot. Nice to meet you.”</p><p>It continued in that vein for a couple of minutes, the two teenage guards sniping back and forth with Sarutobi interjecting the occasional comment. Harry loosened up a little, still primed for trouble but less wary. This wasn’t so bad. The mood was good, nobody was popping out from the shadows to attempt a bit of murder, the shinobi seemed at ease and unconcerned.</p><p>Then Uchiha Shisui wandered in through the gates. Harry blinked rapidly, forgetting all subtlety in his surprise.</p><p>“Hey Shisui-kun,” Sarutobi called out, hand cupped around his mouth. He popped the cigarette out of his mouth and hooked a thumb at Harry. “I met an acquaintance of yours on the way back!”</p><p>It was a friendly call-out, so there was no real reason to be wary. Harry turned to face the Uchiha he’d met on the outskirts of Tanzaku Gai and tried to look as friendly as Sarutobi sounded.</p><p>Shisui made a beeline for their small group, high-fiving Kotetsu as a greeting before turning to the older shinobi.</p><p>“I didn’t know you were back! Neat. So what acquaintance of mine did you meet?”</p><p>Sarutobi shifted on his feet, casting a slick glance Harry’s way. Shisui leaned around to look him in the face and his eyebrows crinkled over the bridge of his nose in fairly obvious confusion.</p><p>“Hello again. I made it here,” Harry said, very well aware that his Tanzaku Gai peacock getup and his current wear didn’t match each other at all. Plus it had been nighttime when they met the first time. No wonder the teen didn’t recognize him.</p><p>“Hang on – you’re – from Tanzaku Gai?”</p><p>Harry nodded. He thought he felt a nigh imperceptible stiffness fade out of the other three shinobi at the Uchiha’s recognition, but that could just be paranoia on his part.</p><p>Shisui lit up slightly with recognition. “You made it here! Good job.”</p><p>If it sounded a little like how a pre-school teacher would praise a smart seven-year-old, at least this shinobi was making an effort to be semi-polite. Harry would take what he could get at this point. He smiled, teeth only slightly gritted.</p><p>“Well, I have bullies to report to the police,” he said, going for another casual shrug. “Thanks for your help back then.”</p><p>“No problem. So Asuma-san ran into you on the way?”</p><p>Sarutobi was grinding the butt of his cigarette into the ground, but looked up at the sound of his name. “More or less.”</p><p>“So what’s your name? I didn’t catch it last time.”</p><p>“Harry Potter.” It was sort of nice to be able to say his name and not immediately have the person he was speaking to glance up at his forehead. Shisui smiled and started enthusiastically telling the other shinobi about their fleeting encounter by Tanzaku Gai. The friendliness was a little infectious and just sort of, well, <em>nice</em> after everything that had happened.</p><p>Then four masked people dropped out of the sky and landed in a semi-circle around them. That was less nice. A lot less nice, actually.</p><p>All the shinobi stilled as one, their conversation fading into silence.</p><p>Sarutobi grunted, a sound of displeasure deep in his throat. “This is too much. By far<em>.</em> And not at all in line with what I requested.”</p><p>And <em>there</em> was that neck-prickling, ominous feeling bearing fruit. The shinobi turned to glance at him and Harry felt like an idiot. A betrayed idiot. Stupid. <em>Stupid</em>.</p><p>All he’d wanted to do was investigate the Sharingan rumors so he could get back home. He hadn’t wanted to come to this village at all. He didn’t care about the slug alcoholic or the tiny murderer or the poofy gray-haired man, not really. He should have just snuck his way in. Or let Sarutobi fade into the poison’s embrace. But of course he’d never really been able to just leave people behind and once again that had come back to bite him. Well, he’d just have to –</p><p>“I specifically referred to him as a 'non-hostile, potential ally' in my memo. Has the meaning of 'non-hostile' or ‘ally’ changed while I was away?”</p><p>Sarutobi was glaring at the animal masks. Harry hesitated, on the edge of Apparition.</p><p>One of the masked people tilted their head slightly. “We have no intention to harm the civilian, but our orders are to secure him.”</p><p>And really, that was enough of that. Harry snorted. “’The civilian’ has no intention of going anywhere with you.”</p><p>All the masked people turned to look at him, their gazes made eerie by the animal masks. Harry glared up at them, already fed up. Fucking shinobi bullshit.</p><p>“I came here to make a complaint about some asshole shinobi acting like complete twats for no reason. I guess I’ll add you to that list, you creepy would-be kidnappers.”</p><p>Harry knew his voice was dripping with dislike and didn’t care. ‘The civilian’, like he wasn’t standing right here. Like he was just a thing that could be picked up and hassled by shinobi when they felt like it.</p><p>“Hear, hear,” Sarutobi muttered. “I only wanted an escort to the Hokage’s tower, not a damn ANBU cell.”</p><p>Okay, so maybe Sarutobi was on his side. Sort of. At least partially. That was the only thing keeping Harry from flying off the handle and hexing the petting zoo tag-team to hell and back.</p><p>“Wait, are you the new bloodlimit guy?”</p><p>Harry whipped around to stare at Izumo, who was staring at him with his mouth half-open.</p><p>Hagane slapped him upside the head. “Really a motor-mouth moron.”</p><p>Uchiha Shisui blinked. Blinked again. “Wait – you’re the – <em>you’re</em> Itachi’s duck guy?”</p><p>“The – what?” Harry frowned in confusion.</p><p>“We should move this to the Hokage’s office.” Sarutobi turned to smile at the eerie animal masks, the expression an acrid twist of his lips. “We don’t need your help to find the Hokage’s tower, thank you.”</p><p>It was clearly a dismissal, but Harry was surprised when the masked people actually took it as such and disappeared. Maybe Sarutobi had some real authority here? If he did and he really was on Harry’s side, then perhaps Harry wouldn’t need to take off just jet. Despite their obvious and alarming interest in his ‘bloodlimit’.</p><p>“I promise that nobody will hurt you,” Sarutobi said quietly and Harry was jarred out of his agitated thoughts by the apparent sincerity in the man’s voice. How much of that was real and how much of it was for show was anybody’s guess though. He’d had no idea that Sarutobi had sent information to Leaf ahead of their arrival or what it meant that he’d done so. What it meant that he was now defending Harry from these ‘ANBU’ people.</p><p><em>What the hell do I make of this situation?</em> Harry thought, gaze flickering away. Was he being threatened or not? Was this a trap to catch a shiny new bloodlimit to add to the village’s collection? He could always Apparate away if that was the case. He wouldn’t let anybody ‘escort’ him anywhere he didn’t freely choose to go himself.</p><p>That was the sharp, sturdy thought that made his answering smile to Sarutobi’s reassurance steel-bright.</p><p>“I guess it wouldn’t hurt to make my complaints directly to your Hokage.”</p><p>From somewhere in the back of his mind, Hermione’s voice pointed out that curiosity was what killed the cat. Then again, satisfaction was what brought it back.</p><p><em>Let’s see what these shinobi have in mind</em>.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Harry does not like these randomly appearing animal cosplayers .__. but he has too much curiosity for his own good.</p><p>Asuma POV was fun but a challenge, hope ya'll liked it.</p><p>Comments very welcome!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. yarn</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It started raining on their way to the Hokage’s tower. The dark clouds came storming across the sky to cast down a deluge that was frankly extremely irritating. Harry squinted up at the sky, blinking away the drops that caught in his eyes. People were scuttling out of the weather, into alleys and behind doors. He glanced over the buildings and saw shinobi people doing their best frog impression across the roofs above.</p><p><em>Aren’t people annoyed that shinobi use their houses as jump-off points? It’s got to be loud to have them bouncing around like that, </em>Harry thought, busy ignoring Uchiha Shisui’s rapid-fire questions about ducks and other waterfowl.</p><p>“So what do you think about the village?” asked Sarutobi, frowning at a dripping cigarette. The rain was clinging to his hair and beard, which gave him a grungy drowned-cat look he couldn’t quite make work.</p><p>“Wet,” said Harry, thankful for the interruption. The streets were almost empty now, its people having scurried indoors. There were some shinobi still perched on roofs ahead and Harry spotted a small blond boy peeking out from behind a dumpster in an alley, but nobody interrupted their way to the Hokage’s tower.</p><p><em>I’ll make an amazing first impression dripping all over the village leader’s office,</em> Harry thought wryly. <em>I hope the floor is waterproof</em>.</p><p>“These storms pass quickly,” Sarutobi said, glancing up at the sky with a perfectly reasonable amount of grumpiness.</p><p>“By then we’ll be soaked to the bone.” <em>Thank Merlin I’m good at drying charms</em>.</p><p>“At least you’ll be soaked in good company,” Shisui said brightly.</p><p>Harry glanced at him and then let his eyes pass over the rest of their increasingly damp group. “Uh, yeah, on that note… why are all of you coming with us?”</p><p>“Curiosity!” said Kamizuki, which sounded like a very obvious lie. Harry sighed. Whatever, at least this was a better escort than the troop of circus animal from before.</p><p>The Hokage’s tower was finally in sight, though it looked more like three squat half-domes than a tower. Bright red in color, they stood out against the grey weather like stop signs. Far behind the buildings loomed a bunch of surly stone heads carved out of the mountainside that walled in this part of the village. They reminded Harry of that one American muggle monument he couldn’t recall the name of, Rush-something-or-other.</p><p><em>That’s actually pretty brilliant.</em> Harry stopped for a moment to stare up at them in curiosity. That the stone heads were the previous village leaders was a probably a fair assumption. The stone had been darkened to a murky grey color by the rain and in that rain-drenched hue underneath the dim sky, they made quite the forbidding group portrait.</p><p>“And here we are,” Kamizuki piped up. He skipped ahead to open the gates to the largest of the three half-domes, the one that most deserved to be called a ‘tower’.</p><p>Harry cocked his head thoughtfully at the seeming emptiness of their surroundings. There was no way a village leader would be without some kind of guard, was there?</p><p>He cast a furtive<em> Homenum Revelio</em> and tried not to jolt back at the revealing flare of over a dozen presences hidden about the area. Two were right above their group, perched in the red maple tree shadowing the gates.</p><p><em>Bloody hell.</em> Keeping the startled spike in his heartbeat from showing proved difficult, so Harry focused on looking impressed by the building itself as he stepped in over the threshold. If they noticed his surprise, let them think it was due to the grandeur of the Hokage’s tower.</p><p>Which really was impressive, in a low-profile super-rich kind of way. Polished wooden flooring, ornate wallpaper and unfurled parchment scrolls on the walls with what might have been calligraphic proverbs. It was too difficult to read the exceptionally squiggly-looking squiggles to say for sure, but in Harry’s experience, convoluted proverbs tended to be paired with fancy looping writing.  In what was probably the reception area stood human-sized glass vases with long, thin branches displayed in a way that screamed ‘indecipherable minimalistic modern art!’ of the kind that Harry knew exactly zilch about.</p><p>Leaving little puddles of water behind them, their little group passed the artsy arrangement and proceeded up a spiral staircase until they ended up in front of green door with red accents and large brass handles. It was the fanciest door they’d passed yet, so the Hokage’s office was probably on the other side.</p><p>The human-revealing spell told him there were two people inside the room and two hidden people outside the windows behind him, opposite the door.</p><p><em>Great. Shinobi everywhere.</em> Harry’s lips tightened into a thin line. Being surrounded like this made the back of his neck itch.</p><p>Sarutobi knocked on the door and the voice of an older man called them in. There was a ripple of attention or awareness in all the shinobi present, a subtle sense of them straightening their backs and minding their steps without actually changing their postures. It reminded Harry a bit of how it felt to be called into Dumbledore’s office.</p><p>“Hey, dad,” said Sarutobi as he stepped inside and Harry tried so hard not to react to that revelation that he probably sprained something in his back. So Sarutobi was the Hokage’s son -- no wonder he’d reported back to the village if his father was the one running it. Harry dripped thoughtfully over the office’s pristine flooring as he considered this new information.</p><p>“Welcome back, Asuma,” said the old man seated behind the desk at the end of the room. Definitely a leader. He had that aura of long-time power and confidence all older leaders Harry had ever met seemed to have. Large windows let in the light from the streetlamps outside and framed the Hokage and the desk before him. Rain pitter-pattered against the glass and in the far distance over the forest outside the village, lightning cleaved the sky into dark, cloudy pieces.</p><p>All in all, it made for a somewhat intimidating picture.</p><p>There was a pile of books on the Hokage’s desk. Harry’s gaze passed over it very briefly and then lurched back. Because on top of the book-pile sat a plump little duck with its beak pushed into the nook under its wing.</p><p><em>Oh</em>. Harry glanced at Uchiha Shisui. <em>‘Duck guy’, huh? So that’s what he meant.</em></p><p>The Hokage folded his hands beneath his chin. “And who is your new acquaintance?”</p><p>Sarutobi’s expression looked faintly amused, maybe a little sardonic. Like he knew the question was redundant. The fact that Harry had been recognized by shinobi other than Sarutobi, paired with presence of the sleeping duck, made it pretty damn clear that the Hokage knew who he was.</p><p>“This is Harry Potter, from Water country.”</p><p>Harry sort of snapped to attention, mostly not on purpose. The Hokage’s regard was a heavy spotlight. “Er, hello.”</p><p>
  <em>What does one say to the champion murderer at the top of the pyramid?</em>
</p><p>“Hello, young man.” He withdrew a pipe from his sleeve and lit it. “I hear you have been helping my shinobi.”</p><p>“Sarutobi helped me,” Harry said with a tight shrug. He didn’t know what to make of the small smile curled around the pipe’s mouthpiece. The fact that there was another person hidden in the corner of the room made it seem less than welcoming. Probably just a concealed guard, but still.</p><p>“Hmm. Two of my other shinobi encountered you previously in the forests of Fire country.”</p><p>His gaze slid toward the sleeping duck and Harry realized with a flash of sharp awareness that since the Hokage obviously knew that he could turn weapons into animals and probably that he could Apparate, he couldn’t claim that his bloodlimit was limited to what he had shown during his and Sarutobi’s fight with the Rock-nin.</p><p>Fuck. So much for that plan.</p><p>But he could turn the conversation on its head before it could begin and draw attention to what Hermione would probably call the shinobi’s ‘unconscionable’ rudeness-slash-murderousness.</p><p>Harry took a subtle breath. “The poofy-haired beanstalk guy and the tiny rude brat didn’t seem too happy with my interference.”</p><p>From behind him came the sound of someone smothering a laugh into a cough. Harry snuck a glance at Sarutobi and saw his jaws work and the corners of his mouth tic. Well, okay then. That was a better reaction than expected. At least none of them were throwing knives at his head.</p><p><em>In for a penny…</em> “Anyway, that’s actually why I’m here. To complain.”</p><p>“Complain.”</p><p>“Yes, about some idiot ninja running loose.”</p><p>“…Idiot ninja.”</p><p>“Yes, sir.” It seemed important to add a ‘sir’ there at the end, just to be polite. To show these shinobi how politeness was done, etc.</p><p>The Hokage puffed away at his pipe rather forcefully. From the corner of his eyes, Harry snuck another glance at Sarutobi and found him with his eyes squeezed shut into little crinkles.</p><p>“If you wouldn’t mind explaining further...?” prompted the Hokage, expression illegible between his vigorous puffs on the pipe.</p><p>Harry launched into an explanation of his first meeting with shinobi, trying to help and being treated like an enemy for his trouble. Then he explained his adventure in Tanzaku Gai with the slug alcoholic and had to stop in the middle of that recount to twist back and stare at the shinobi, most of whom were making peculiar sounds. They quieted when Harry turned to stare and tried for nonchalant looks, but it was clear that they recognized his description of the blonde woman with the fearsome right hook. Harry squinted at them suspiciously.</p><p>“Anyway, then I met Uchiha Shisui, who directed me toward Leaf. I kind of, eh, encountered Sarutobi on the way here...” He trailed off there and Sarutobi smoothly picked up the thread, summarizing their fight with the Rock-nin and the journey to the village. He alluded to Harry’s own skills, but in a way that left Harry unable to figure out if the other shinobi in the room understood what Sarutobi was actually talking about. Maybe the exact details of this ‘bloodlimit’ business were hush-hush even among fellow Leaf shinobi.</p><p>“I suppose I could understand why you would have complaints in light of these events,” The Hokage said on a smoky exhale. Harry still couldn’t read him and resisted the urge to shift on his feet just to rid himself of the nervous tension in his legs.</p><p>“Still, you might understand that I have further questions?” He waited for Harry to nod and then began tapping the remains of tobacco from his pipe. “And that I would appreciate you remaining in the village until those questions have been answered to my satisfaction.”</p><p>That sounded like a not-very-veiled threat. And Harry didn’t respond very well to threats. Any snooty pureblooded Slytherin, Death Eater, Gryffindor-turned-traitor or lionesque Minister for Magic could have told this powerful old man that.</p><p>Harry smiled with all his teeth showing. “I hope you’ll understand that I’m going to stay only for as long as I want to.”</p><p>The Hokage stopped tapping his pipe, his eyes sliding slowly up from the tobacco remains to meet Harry’s. Yes, that gaze was still heavy. But Harry had faced other heavy gazes head-on. Had kind of made a youthful career out of facing all the world’s powerful and/or influential assholes head-on.</p><p>"And I suppose we couldn’t keep you if you wanted to leave?”</p><p>Yeah, the Hokage definitely knew about Apparition. No surprise at this point, but it still sent a sliver of unease fizzing through his middle.</p><p>“I don’t know if you could, but I don’t see why you would. Or why you’d think you have the right.”</p><p>Harry tried to choose his words with more care now that he felt the situation shifting precariously under his feet. He could still Apparate away, transfigure himself into anonymity and start a quiet investigation, but he didn’t want to do that kind of precarious high-level cloak and dagger stuff if it wasn’t necessary. Sneaking around and trying not to be spotted by any shinobi would make the investigation twice as difficult even if it was doable.</p><p>“Bloodlimits are very valuable to all hidden villages.”</p><p>Harry stiffened a little. He hadn’t been prepared for the bluntness and what the Hokage was implying with that seemingly non-sequitur sentence was setting off every alarm bell. So much for Sarutobi’s assurances that he could leave after making the complaint.</p><p>Then the Hokage sighed, set the pipe down on the desktop and rubbed his eyes. And suddenly he looked more, well, <em>human</em>.</p><p>“With that said, we are not in the habit of kidnapping lone survivors of clans.”</p><p>The old man seemed to be waiting for something, but Harry wasn’t sure what that statement was supposed to be. Was he or was he not being threatened? Because that sounded like a roll-back of the veiled intimidation from before. Unease and confusion rattled around behind his ribs like spiky little marbles.</p><p>Harry did his best not to show it. He was good at <em>not</em> baring his throat, at <em>not</em> backing down, at <em>not</em> rolling over. At sticking his chin out and up and taking on the challenge.</p><p>“Good, because I’m not in the habit of being kidnapped.” At least he hadn’t been since fourth year and the graveyard.</p><p>Someone clapped their hands together and Harry jolted at the sound. He turned to see Uchiha Shisui with his palms together, grinning.</p><p>“Great! So nobody’s being kidnapped or leaving right now. And where does that leave our new friend?”</p><p>His sunny disposition was almost brutal in its brightness. Harry looked him over, trying to figure out if it was genuine. There were more ways to hide your true intentions than behind an unreadable mask.</p><p>Shisui went on. “He needs a place to stay if he has no urgent plans to leave. Filing formal complaints can take several days.”</p><p><em>Uh-huh</em>, Harry thought and narrowed his eyes a little. <em>Sure it can. You’ll make sure of that, I bet</em>.</p><p>“He can crash at my place,” said Sarutobi and that honestly didn’t sound too bad. At least it wasn’t an Auror holding cell, dosed with calming potions and charmed stuck to the floor.</p><p>“Or he can stay with me,” said Shisui and Harry forced himself not to show the surge of eagerness at the suggestion. If Shisui lived with the other Uchiha, investigating the capabilities of the Sharingan would be significantly easier.</p><p><em>And don’t I deserve a lucky break?</em> He’d had so few of those.</p><p>“You’re all bizarrely eager to get stuck with babysitting duty,” said one of the two gate guards behind them. They’d been doll-silent until now and Harry had almost forgotten their presence.</p><p>“I owe him,” said Sarutobi with a faint smile.</p><p>Shisui shrugged. “I just want to throw him at Itachi! Maybe pester him a bit about ducks and whatnot.”</p><p>“I, too, have some questions about ‘ducks and whatnot’,” the Hokage said slowly, his pipe lit again.</p><p>“I’m sure you do,” Harry muttered. The bloodlimit bullshit had seemed like a good plan, but now that it was in action, he was kind of starting to regret it. He still couldn’t think of a better lie to explain his abilities though, and he had less than zero percent interest in sharing the truth about his magic.</p><p>“I’ve already explained to Harry-san that Leaf is not like Mist,” Sarutobi said, his voice so flat and calm that it was definitely a multilayered statement of some sort. If Harry knew more about Mist, perhaps he would have been able to read the nuances in the look that passed between Sarutobi and his father.</p><p>The Hokage finally nodded. “Very true. Hidden Leaf is not Hidden Mist. All the same, I do not think that Harry-san should stay with a recently returned shinobi so closely connected to the Hokage.”</p><p>“Alright.” Sarutobi’s smile was sardonic again, maybe even a little bitter. Though Harry didn’t know the reason for that trace of bitterness, it still kind of made him want to hex the Hokage.</p><p>“So is he gonna stay with the Uchiha clan?” asked Hagane, leaning over Shisui’s shoulder.</p><p>“<em>He</em> is going to stay where <em>he</em> wants to stay,” said Harry, voice whip-sharp. For fuck’s sake, the rudeness was so casual it was difficult not to balk and wonder if they were doing it on purpose. Yes, staying with the Uchiha would dovetail with his plans but he didn’t really have it in him to allow them to think he could be controlled like a fucking <em>pet</em>.</p><p>Hagane blinked and shut his mouth on whatever else he’d planned to say.</p><p>“Bit of a firework, aren’t you?” said Shisui with a half-grin.</p><p>Harry snorted. “Whenever necessary. And it’s been necessary quite often with you lot.”</p><p>“Ouch.” Shisui glanced at the Hokage and then back at Harry. “So can I take him in – if <em>he</em> wants to?”</p><p>There was a pause before the village leader acquiesced. “For the time being.”</p><p>More undercurrents, this time probably of the political variety. Felt like it anyway. But Shisui whooped and clapped him on the shoulder, so Harry put the thought aside for now.</p><p>“So do you want to come stay with me for a while?” he asked in an overly polity way that made Harry want to flick him on the nose. But good behavior should be rewarded. That’s why you gave dogs treats when they performed tricks.</p><p>“Sure. Thank you for <em>asking</em>.” He put emphasis on that last part and then thought for a moment. “I’m still going to leave if I feel like it.”</p><p>Shisui laughed through his nose, looking him up and down. “You do that.”</p><p>Being underestimated was infuriating but useful, so Harry tamped down on the impulse to start yelling at Shisui’s pacifying tone.</p><p>“A guard detail will be with you during your stay,” the Hokage added, gaze heavy with obscure intentions. “That is routine for all foreign visitors.”</p><p>Nobody contradicted him, of course. Harry still wondered if that was really the truth. And if the Hokage really meant ‘watcher’ rather than ‘guard’. Also…</p><p>“Guard? Like the petting zoo team from before?” He didn’t want those creepy weirdoes hanging around.</p><p>There were several very loud snorts from behind him and Harry turned around to find the group of shinobi staring innocently at the ceiling. Nobody moved a muscle while Harry stared them down.</p><p>“…Petting zoo?”</p><p>“Those weird people in animal costumes.” Harry glanced back at the Hokage and waved vaguely at his own face to indicate their disguised faces. “Or carnival masks or whatever.”</p><p>“The ANBU team, I assume.”</p><p>“Sure, okay,” said Harry, mostly because the Hokage looked exasperated and Harry was feeling a little asshole-ish. But since the old man had called them ‘<em>the</em> ANBU team’, that probably meant that he’d been the one to send them. Or at least that he’d been aware of them having been sent to… <em>fetch</em> him.</p><p>“Anyway,” Harry continued, feeling generously spiteful, “I didn’t like them much. They seem like an especially rude sort. Can I have a non-animal shinobi as a guard instead?”</p><p>“No. You’ll have to make do,” said the Hokage, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Shisui-kun, you may take your new charge with you. Asuma, please stay behind. Harry-san, I’ll be scheduling a meeting some time tomorrow to discuss things further –”</p><p>The duck took an opportunity to quack and the Hokage paused, looking sort of pained at the interruption. Harry’s lips twitched. The transfiguration had held up really well, which was no real surprise but still a relief.</p><p>“Seriously, how did you do that?” Shisui asked in a hushed voice, staring at the duck. “Itachi said it was one of his kunai and you just sort of waved at it to make it into a duck.”</p><p>There were confused exclamations from the guards and Harry’s good mood petered out. He really didn’t want the oddness of his supposed bloodlimit to become general knowledge among the shinobi here. Especially if shinobi didn’t have any techniques similar to transfiguration – that would make the ability seem too foreign. Sarutobi was looking at him thoughtfully too, <em>ugh</em>.</p><p>“That is one of many questions I wish to discuss tomorrow,” said the Hokage, eyeing the duck that was now waddling across the desk only to stop and plop down atop a pile of papers on the other side.</p><p><em>So I guess I have until tomorrow to come up with a more comprehensive overview of my ‘bloodlimit’</em>, Harry thought, biting the inside of his cheek. Why wasn’t the Hokage pushing for a meeting now? Or later today?</p><p>There had to be a reason for the delay. It couldn’t be something as simple as thoughtful regard for how long he’d been traveling, how weary he was.</p><p>That sort of luck was <em>never</em> Harry’s due.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>No Harry, Lady Luck is never really on your side.</p><p>I meant to get a bit further with this chapter than the convo with the Hokage, but that didn't end up happening. Oh well. Bonus spoiler for the next chapter: A wild tiny rude murderer and his baby brother appears!</p><p>Comments very welcome!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. eyes</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The rain had stilled into a moderate drizzle when Harry and the group of shinobi emerged from the tower. None of the streets even here in the village center were asphalted or lined with cobblestone, just pure dirt-and-gravel road that had turned into muddy, water-pooled earth by the heavy rain.</p><p>Sarutobi stepped out after them a few minutes later, expression drawn and brooding.</p><p>“We can pop over to me right away if you want,” Shisui said, eying Sarutobi but facing Harry, and fell back from where he’d been speaking to the gate guards.</p><p>“He hasn’t eaten in a while,” Sarutobi spoke up from beside Harry. Whatever was troubling him turned his voice into a distracted murmur.</p><p>Harry still threw him an irritated glance. “<em>We</em> haven’t eaten in a while.”</p><p>The corner of Sarutobi’s mouth lifted. “Fair.”</p><p>“There’s a barbecue place close to the Uchiha compound. We could pick something up,” said Shisui, cocking his head in question. There was an energy to him here in the village that hadn’t been there when Harry had first met the Uchiha outside Tanzaku Gai. Perhaps it was simply the difference between being on and off duty.</p><p>“I don’t really have much money.” He’d only taken from the hamlet what he absolutely needed to survive for a little while, and he hadn’t needed to steal more during the journey to the village.</p><p>“My treat! I just got back from the village, so I’m currently loaded,” said Shisui, grinning. “And I was planning on meeting up with someone there anyhow.”</p><p>“Good, then you can treat me too,” said Sarutobi, lighting up another cigarette. Harry wondered if being back in his father’s village was what made him want to chain-smoke or if that urge was due to being stuck surrounded by his fellow shinobi.</p><p><em>If I was stuck with shinobi around the clock, I might take up chain-smoking too, </em>he thought and gave Sarutobi a sympathetic glance.</p><p>“We have to head back to the gates,” said Hagane and without waiting for a reply, he and Kamizuki disappeared in a little tornado of leaves. The resulting leaf piles were sort of strange, since there weren’t any trees on this street. They also left a mess for the street sweepers to clean up, but that sort of casual rudeness seemed par for the course for these shinobi people.</p><p><em>I’d definitely need Hog’s weed to survive living in this place without exploding,</em> Harry thought, a little guiltily since he’d promised both Hermione and Ginny to stay away from that stuff. <em>Or maybe a Never-Ending Firewhisky. Some sort of relaxant anyway.</em></p><p>The pathways here were a colorful muddle and as the rain slowly cleared and the sun lit every visible nook and cranny, Harry almost forgot his dripping hair, general frustration, and the fact that he hadn’t had an opportunity to use a discrete drying charm. Walking through the lighted streets, the village reminded him a bit of the Burrow – houses stacked atop other houses like Jenga or like a child’s building blocks.</p><p>Thinking too hard about the Burrow made an invisible fist of homesickness squeeze his insides.</p><p>“You alright, Harry-san?” Shisui said, tilting a look at Harry without slowing his stride.</p><p>“Never better.” The words stumbled out in a mutter through the boulder in his throat.</p><p>Harry spotted the two shinobi giving each other a look. The boulder shattered and turned to gravel in a blaze of irritation. He glared at the back of their heads.</p><p>
  <em>I could make so many ducks from your little knives. So many. And I could make them shower you like a demented duckrain.</em>
</p><p>“Here we are!”</p><p>Harry looked up to where Shisui was gesturing to see a <em>literal</em> hole in the wall. Well, a square hole decorated with flowers and with a countertop jutting out at the bottom. It was homier than he’d expected, like someone had just decided to drop what they were doing to try their hand at making a little kiosk. It fit with the rest of the village’s muddled architecture, Harry thought with a hidden smile. It wasn’t bad – it would have fit into some tucked-away corner of Hogsmeade.</p><p>The scent of sizzling meat and spicy sauces drifted out through the opening, and only then did Harry realize how hungry he was.</p><p>“You order here, but the entrance is over there…” Shisui took a couple of steps to the side, where a bright blue door with squiggly writing invited people in.</p><p>“I don’t want to drip into the food,” Harry said, leaning forward when he spotted the doors to a restroom inside. Finally, privacy. “So I’ll go dry off first.”</p><p>“Alright. We’ll order ahead of you,” Shisui said, gazing up in apparent rapture at the menu posted over the counter.</p><p>“Why this restaurant? I thought you didn’t like barbecue,” Harry heard Sarutobi ask as he made his way inside.</p><p>“Well…”</p><p>He missed Shisui’s reply in the indoor din of chopsticks against ceramics. Catching sight of the restroom’s interior, he noted that it at least seemed have stalls. Thank Merlin. The damp clothing rubbed unpleasantly against his skin when he moved and he was well past refusing the small luxury of dry clothes. He couldn’t take one more minor irritation or he’d be liable to start setting things on fire.</p><p>And the restroom was reasonably clean and only half-occupied! Finally a stroke of minor good luck.</p><p>At the exact moment that relieved thought arose, a familiar tiny murderer stepped out of a stall.</p><p>Harry stared. The murderer stared back, looking slightly startled. The child he was holding by the hand sucked his thumb aggressively, eyes wide and dark.</p><p><em>Ugh, what a scene</em>, Harry thought, irritated and damp.</p><p>“You,” said the boy, who going by Shisui’s previous rambles was probably called ‘Itachi’, and moved to stand slightly in front of the child. “What are you doing here?”</p><p>Did the boy really think Harry was about to dive across the tiled floor and steal the little kid? Harry eyed them both. Probably-named-Itachi was plainly wary, but not as murderous as the last time they’d met. That softened the planes of his face and made him look younger.</p><p><em>Quack quack, brat,</em> Harry thought but didn’t say.</p><p>He could feel a smile threatening to break through and bit his tongue to keep it from emerging. One wrong move and the kid would probably start throwing knives. The child behind him was clearly the source of the extra heaping of tension, which was fair enough.</p><p>“Uchiha Shisui invited me,” he said and gave an amused mental snort when that made Itachi’s eyes widen slightly, just for a second. The brief expression lent him a striking resemblance to the younger child.</p><p>“Why would Shisui know you?”</p><p>So he definitely knew Shisui. Good.</p><p>“He doesn’t, but Sarutobi Asuma knows him and I know Sarutobi,” Harry said. It was close enough to the truth. “They’re waiting outside.”</p><p>Harry glanced towards the exit and felt the kid follow the line of his gaze. The two shinobi couldn’t be seen from here, but hopefully the gesture itself would be enough.</p><p>Apparently it <em>was</em> enough, because Itachi glided around him like a mistrustful cat, pushing the younger kid in front of himself to make sure he stayed out of Harry’s reach.</p><p>Probably the tiny murderer’s little brother, Harry decided. They looked enough alike for it, barring their contrasting expressions. One frowny cat and one wide-eyed kitten. He watched them leave with a half-smile, only heading for one of the stalls when they were out of sight.</p><p>The first thing he did when the stall door closed was cast a <em>Homenem Revelio</em> to check for the ‘guard detail’ the Hokage had promised.</p><p><em>Uh-huh.</em> There they were, Harry presumed, gaze darting up. A presence was perched like a lost messenger owl outside on the roof. Rolling his eyes, Harry set about charming himself dry. He left his hair wet to make sure he didn’t emerge suspiciously un-dampened to the shinobi’s eyes.</p><p><em>Merlin, what a relief.</em> No more cloth clinging to his skin. No more sinking his toes into wet soles.</p><p>Harry emerged from the restroom with an easy bound in his step. The owl-like presence followed his journey back out of the restaurant, so clearly the guard had some way to track him sight unseen. Good to know.</p><p>“You took so long Shisui ended up ordering for you,” was all Sarutobi said when Harry rejoined them.</p><p>“Yes, a whole 3 minutes,” Harry said, voice dry as desert sand. “I take it that along with manners, patience is another thing shinobi aren’t taught growing up.”</p><p>“Bah, who needs patience?” Shisui bounced up with the tiny murderer in tow, but sans wide-eyed child. Apparently the younger kid’s absence allowed Itachi to relax, or at least unclench enough to appear less like a cat on the verge of hissing.</p><p>Harry shrugged. “Not you, apparently. So what am I getting to eat?”</p><p>“Yakiniku,” said Shisui, which explained nothing, but he handed Harry a meat skewer that looked a lot like what he’d eaten during his short stay in the hamlet.</p><p>He checked it for tampering as subtly as he could the moment it was in his hand, and was almost surprised when the <em>Specialis Revelio</em> showed no signs of anything untoward. He’d expected an attempt at – well, something. Not necessarily poison, but <em>something</em>.</p><p>Not the time to look a gift horse in the mouth, Harry decided, and started wolfing it down. His eyes watered with pleasure and his stomach growled. Perfectly grilled, sauced and seasoned with Harry’s own hunger, it was the best meal he’d had in a long time.</p><p>“Slow down, you’ll choke,” said Sarutobi and Harry stuck out his tongue mid-bite.</p><p>He made short work of the food and then pointed the empty skewer at Shisui. “So you do know one of the idiot ninja.”</p><p>Shisui promptly choked on his own food. The tiny murderer looked baffled.</p><p>“That’s – a first – for you, eh, Itachi-kun? ‘Idiot ninja’ Itachi – genius – clan heir.” Shisui was wheezing between every other word, which was a bit much. Harry flicked the wooden skewer at him, disappointed when the teen’s hand shot up to catch it seemingly by reflex.</p><p>“I’m an idiot ninja?” Itachi asked carefully, looking even more mystified. He seemed to be tasting the words as if trying to puzzle out their meaning.</p><p>“An idiot ninja with no manners,” Harry said helpfully. “Trying to kill people for no reason and so on,” he added when that picture-perfect description of Itachi’s previous behavior didn’t seem to be ringing any bells.</p><p>Itachi sort of flinched without moving. Like the muscles of his back had jumped and then settled. Shisui’s cackling laughter trailed off and he threw an arm over the younger boy’s shoulders.</p><p>“I was unaware that you were genuine in your attempts to assist us,” said Itachi, abruptly formal.</p><p><em>So now I’ve seen what a ninja looks like when they’re uncomfortable</em>. Putting that expression on the boy’s face was less satisfying in reality than it had been in his mind.</p><p>“Yes, your response kind of gave that away. But you have a lot of time to make it up to me, since I’ll be crashing with your friend here,” Harry said and nodded at Shisui.</p><p>Itachi twitched. “Crashing?”</p><p>His gaze slid towards Shisui with a smoothness that failed to disguise some measure of alarm or inner turmoil on his part.</p><p>Harry nodded easily. “Yes, I’ve been <em>politely</em> asked to stay with Shisui for a while. Lucky me and lucky him.”</p><p>“And lucky Itachi-kun!” said Shisui, squeezing the younger boy with a striking lack of concern for Itachi’s obvious discomfort. The younger boy clearly didn’t feel particularly lucky.</p><p>“I have a mission early tomorrow,” Itachi said. “I will need to spend most of the night preparing for it together with my team.”</p><p>Shisui grinned. “That’s hours away, so no worries. Until then, you can stick by us.”</p><p>“Shisui, you shouldn’t bully him so much,” Sarutobi said, but he was amused enough for the sentence to seem goading. And like that was some sort of signal, or just a step too far, Itachi shook Shisui’s arms off his shoulders.</p><p>He turned to Harry with military precision. “I apologize for attacking you.”</p><p>…Well, that kind of took the fun out of it. And made filing an official complaint seem kind of mean. Harry eyed the boy and tried to judge his level of sincerity. It was doubtful that Itachi believed in his complete innocence, but there was something about the boy’s overly formal tone and bracing stance that read as genuine.</p><p>“Ugh. <em>Fine</em>. You’re forgiven.”</p><p>Shisui reacted before Itachi could do more than furrow his brows. “What, just like that?”</p><p>Harry made an aggrieved noise. “Should I throw little knives at him in retaliation? I’m not a shinobi, I don’t do things like that.”</p><p>“No, you turn shinobi’s little knives into ducks,” said Sarutobi. An entirely unnecessary and equally unwelcome interjection.</p><p>But Harry conceded he’d walked right into that one. The conversation was taking a turn that made his innards twist nervously. All three of the shinobi looked much too curious, like something important was about to be revealed.</p><p>Harry was happy to realize that he hadn’t yet used his one-a-day allotted freak-out and proceeded to have a very quiet anxiety attack. Silently and on the inside.</p><p>“Your father already made me promise to give a tell-all tomorrow,” Harry muttered finally, smoothing down a couple of damp fly-away locks for want of something to do with his hands.</p><p>Sarutobi gave him a slow look. “And I’m sure you’ll obey that request cheerfully and immediately.”</p><p>Harry gave a reluctant little smile. Damn it, he really was starting to like this guy. Despite himself, despite everything. “Mhm.”</p><p>Sarutobi sighed. “Good luck with that. I’m going to head home –”</p><p>“Head over to that pretty chunin, you mean,” said Shisui and dodged an instantaneous but half-hearted strike from Sarutobi. Itachi was sort of staring at Harry, still resembling a wary cat. Like he didn’t want to show where his attention was directed.</p><p>“Shall we?” Harry asked. “You can lead the way.”</p><p>Itachi gave a jerky little nod and gestured Harry along. In a few years, perhaps that gesture would seem imperious, but right now it reminded Harry a little of how Hermione had acted as a first-year. Trying for commanding and mostly succeeding in looking conceited.</p><p>Shisui finished bantering with Sarutobi and caught up with them. Which was fortunate, because in less than half a minute the silence had grown awkward. Harry was almost impressed that one person could make things awkward so quickly.</p><p><em>This kid can’t be doing much socializing</em>, he reasoned. That was why Hermione had been the way she was, back when they were kids. Too much time spent with adults, not enough time spent around kids her own age. Unused to casual conversations but trying not to show it.</p><p>Harry could feel himself soften and gave himself a mental whack upside the head. This boy was still a little murderer and Harry was in a place where he couldn’t afford to trust anyone, much less someone who’d already tried to kill him. At any rate, all of these people would probably slit his throat if they knew he had plans to investigate the Sharingan.</p><p>It was a sobering thought.</p><p>Shisui took over leading the way to the ‘Uchiha clan compound’ and in only a couple of minutes he was waving Harry in through the gate. Painted on a blue border over the gate were two little symbols Harry thought might be fans. Or berries. It had to be a shinobi version of a wizarding House sigil.</p><p>The space just inside the gates was an open field encircled by a collection of very similar houses, all bearing the little fan-berry symbols. The walls surrounding the compound did more than expected to dull the village sounds, leading the field to feel cut off from the outside world. Its own little bubble, apparently full of nothing but Uchiha family members.</p><p>“Shisui. Welcome back,” said a deep voice that made both shinobi straighten.</p><p>Harry startled from his observations of the compound. He looked over the man and read his importance not only in Itachi’s and Shisui’s responses to the greeting, but in the way he carried himself. This was someone important both by his own estimation and by the estimation of the two young shinobi.</p><p>“Fugaku-sama.”</p><p>“Father.”</p><p>Harry connected the dots like links in a chain – Shisui had called Itachi a ‘clan heir’ and Itachi was calling this man his father. Coupled with their reactions to him, this was probably definitely the Uchiha clan head. The bearing of a sneering aristocrat, skin as pale as molten snake-shedding, deep tear troughs beneath his eyes.</p><p>The man reminded Harry so much of Snape that he wanted nothing more than to Apparate away. Or hex the man, just on principle. A complicated flood of urges surged through him and died down without Harry doing much more than tensing in response.</p><p>
  <em>Look at me, controlling my emotions and shit. Hermione would be proud.</em>
</p><p>“You brought a guest,” said the man and the fact that he was stone-faced rather than sneering gave him a one up on Snape. Or Snape’s memory, as it were.</p><p>“This is Harry Potter, of clan Harry,” said Shisui and Harry blinked and then snorted so hard he ended up sneezing.</p><p>All the shinobi stared at him and none offered him a handkerchief or a ‘bless you’, because of course they didn’t. Those sorts of manners weren’t taught to fancy-ass shinobi. The ghost of a howling Molly Weasley possessed him for a moment, and he genuinely considered starting off his acquaintance with the clan head by way of a lecture.</p><p>“Uh,” Harry said instead, as saner heads prevailed. “Harry is my first name. My family name is Potter.”</p><p><em>Look at me </em>again<em>, checking my impulses at the door. Hermione would be even prouder.</em></p><p>Uchiha Fugaku stared for a moment longer. Perhaps the clan head was resisting the typical shinobi urge to murder him on sight.</p><p>“Pleased to make your acquaintance,” he said slowly, not sounding all that pleased. “How have you come to know Shisui-kun and Itachi?”</p><p>“Well, it all started when your son tried to murder me for no reason,” Harry began, because when pushed just a little too far, like when people randomly looked like hated potions professors, he didn’t have much in the way of manners either. Or much more impulse control to offer in one day. He’d been so good up until now, right? Right. He’d only barely antagonized the Hokage and he’d been nice to the tiny murderer.</p><p>Harry quickly summarized their meeting, his own attempts to help, the shinobi’s rudeness, his decision to file a complaint, and how Itachi had apologized in the end so it was all water under the bridge. Fugaku remained stone-faced throughout the explanation, but his lips pressed together like Snape’s did when he wanted to assign detention.</p><p>Harry gamely finished his recount. “— so now I’m staying here for a while, with Shisui.”</p><p>The clan head turned unhurriedly to look at the teenager. Shisui stared back like a squirrel beneath the gaze of a hawk. Snape had engendered that look very often, so Harry could sympathize.</p><p>Still, he’d like to move this ahead. He only had so much time to plan before the meeting tomorrow. Some ideas for the inner workings of his supposed bloodlimit were already coalescing in the back of his mind, but he needed time to formalize them.</p><p>“Itachi, your Inuzuka teammate is here to see you,” said Fugaku finally, gaze barely releasing Shisui to catch his son’s eyes. That was a total non-sequitur, but Harry couldn’t say what kind of response he’d expected.</p><p>“I take it you wish to install your guest in your rooms,” he continued when Itachi left, turning slightly to face Shisui again. “Please come and see me when you have done so.”</p><p>Finally he flicked a gaze at Harry. “Welcome to Hidden Leaf.”</p><p>That was distinctly un-Snapelike. And relatively polite. For that reason, Harry decided to ignore that the welcome was rather glacial.</p><p>“Thank you for hosting me. And for not trying to kill me.” That last bit was especially important to mention, Harry figured.</p><p>“…You are welcome. I will endeavor to continue not killing you in the future,” Fugaku said and Harry didn’t have enough time to figure out if that was a joke or a threat before the man moved away, following the same path his son had taken.</p><p>Harry turned to the remaining shinobi. “That went pretty well.”</p><p>“Are you suicidal or just masochistic?” Shisui mumbled into his hands, which were currently covering most of his face.</p><p>“’Do no harm but take no shit’,” Harry said, quoting something Angelina had read to him from a muggle magazine before a Quidditch match against the Slytherin team.</p><p>“Let’s just get to my place before I strangle you,” Shisui said, rubbing the heels of his hands into his eyes. “And Fugaku-sama clearly just came from a meeting. From his mood, it wasn’t a fun one –”</p><p>Harry didn’t care overmuch about the Uchiha clan head’s daily schedule, so he zoned out while Shisui muttered to himself. The Uchiha compound seemed like a fairly vast estate. He could see the smoke from several dozen unseen chimneys, and from what he could see in the gaps between the closest houses, there were open spaces between the buildings as well.</p><p>Shisui led him down a trampled-down path in the grass and then stopped dead so suddenly that Harry walked into his back.</p><p>“Uchiha-san,” said a dark, creaky voice. Another person appearing voice-first, like a ghost gliding out of mist. Harry glanced over Shisui’s shoulder and spotted an old man at the end of the path, coming back from the house Shisui had clearly been headed towards.</p><p><em>Even old people can be ninja?</em> Harry’s brows rose. The old man was bandaged up like an Egyptian mummy, so perhaps Leaf could do with a set retirement age to keep their veterans from ending up looking like a postmortem Tutankhamun.</p><p>“Shimura-sama,” said Shisui with the sort of rigid tone that radiated apprehension. It made Harry take a deeper look at the old man and that in turn let his attention catch on the man’s easy posture, his sharp visible eye.</p><p>“And who is your new friend?” The man’s gaze slid oil-slick toward Harry in a way that made him suspect that this ‘Shimura’ knew exactly who he was. Something about his bearing reminded Harry a bit of Scrimgeour, but he couldn’t put his finger on where that likeness originated.</p><p>Shisui stepped forward. “This is Harry-kun. He’s staying here for a while. With Hokage-sama’s permission.”</p><p>There was a conscious pause there that Harry didn’t know what to make of.</p><p>“Yes.” Shimura’s eye remained on Harry. “Welcome to the village, Harry-san.”</p><p>If Fugaku’s welcome had been glacial, Shimura’s welcome was honey over acid. Harry smiled anyway, like he hadn’t realized that this man was a viper through bone and marrow.</p><p>“Thanks, I’m glad to be here.”</p><p>“I will be seeing you tomorrow,” said Shimura with a regal nod. It was clearly meant as a sort of goodbye, but whatever quality this man had that made Harry want to draw up a shield made it sound more like a threat.</p><p><em>Wait, ‘tomorrow’? </em>Harry stared at the old man’s retreating back. <em>Oh. The meeting with the Hokage?</em></p><p>“You’re certainly drawing attention,” said Shisui, tone unreadable and gaze fixed on the old man’s measured retreat.</p><p>Harry shrugged, trying to make the movement casual. “Through no fault of my own. Mostly.”</p><p>“Let’s just get inside.” Shisui eyed the door to what Harry presumed was his house with a covert trepidation. Then his gaze hardened. “And I’m going with you to the meeting tomorrow.”</p><p>Harry made an agreeing noise. It felt somehow like with this brief meeting, things had gotten a lot more complicated all of a sudden.</p><p>Like he needed to get his ducks in a row post-haste.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>You guys, this chapter kicked my ass. I didn't get quite as far as I wanted to story-wise, but I'm trying to stick to my updating schedule, so here you are.</p><p>Comments very welcome!</p><p>And a Merry Christmas to those who celebrate the holiday.</p><p>EDIT: The next chapter will be slightly delayed, due to Christmas and New Years getting in the way of my writing schedule. ;)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0009"><h2>9. fabulist</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Shisui spent an hour peering intently into every dim nook and dusty corner of his house. Whatever he’d expected to find apparently hadn’t materialized, and that seemed to agitate rather than calm him. Harry took Shisui’s distraction as an opportunity to rummage through the kitchen cupboards and make them both brews from a near British-sized assortment of tea.</p><p>“I made you a cup,” Harry said, walking over to where the Uchiha was glaring suspiciously at a scratch in the wall and pressing one of the steaming cups into his hand.</p><p>“Uh, thanks,” Shisui said and downed it like a shot. Very British. Harry approved.</p><p>Shisui spent the next hour bouncing around the training area behind his house, apparently to work off some nervous energy, and that gave Harry a fairly clear idea of what his base-level abilities were. The ability to switch himself with various large-ish objects in the immediate area. The ability to spit gouts of fire that could probably rival a small dragon’s. The knife-throwing that seemed to be a shinobi standard. Shisui was definitely faster than Itachi and he had some kind of technique that reminded Harry a little of Apparition. A more polite version of the leaf-scattering technique the guards had used to disappear before, because Shisui’s quickstep move left no traces behind.</p><p><em>I wonder what movement his range is,</em> Harry thought, eying the teen through the kitchen window. <em>And if this is how shinobi usually do stress relief</em>.</p><p>Shisui was kicking and punching the air, sweeping through movements he’d clearly done a thousand times before. It was easier to follow those movements now than it had been, so perhaps Harry was starting to get used to that ridiculous physical speed.</p><p>It was the first truly quiet moment he’d had for a while. Harry’s thoughts wanted to circle Hermione and Ron – and Teddy, bouncing on Andromeda’s lap. But those thoughts made his insides gray and chilly if he stayed with them for too long. That was how burrowing into painful longing thoughts always felt. He’d learned not to think too hard about the Dursleys, about Sirius’ death, about a thousand bigger and smaller tragedies. Stay in motion. Keep swimming.</p><p>Harry focused on tomorrow. He only had an idea of what he could turn his ‘bloodlimit’ into. Besides Apparition, Sarutobi had definitely seen his <em>Protego</em> and <em>Stupify</em> and Harry couldn’t be sure whether he’d seen more than that. The shield charm and the stunning spell were almost polar opposites in terms of their effects. What sort of bloodlimit could cover both of those abilities?</p><p><em>Something like conjuration? Though it’s pretty obvious they don’t have actual magical conjuration here…</em> The shinobi had been too surprised by the duck for conjuration to be a feature of their ‘chakra’ abilities. But the slug woman had definitely made the giant creature appear out of thin air.</p><p>Conjuration was... hm. There had been a chapter title in one of the transfiguration textbooks that summarized the essence of that sub-branch of magic. Harry scrunched his eyes shut, mentally flipping through what he could remember of the sixth year extra-curricular reading Hermione had made them all do.</p><p><em>‘Chapter 11: Movement and coalescence’,</em> Harry remembered, absently watching a million little dust motes swirl around in the weak light. Conjuration was a type of creation what combined movement and union.</p><p>He tried to picture what he’d seen shinobi do, what might be close enough to magic to build off of.<em> Summoning… Teleportation…</em></p><p>He tasted a couple of ideas. Poked at them, turned them over under a mental microscope. Wished briefly for his best friends’ input. He’d have to play things by ear regardless, but he’d need something that worked as a solid base.</p><p><em>My bloodlimit means I can use a type of teleportation called ‘conjuration’,</em> Harry sounded out in his head, folding his arms over the kitchen table and plopping his head on top. He exhaled every niggling concern that he knew could fuck him over. There was moment of peace as ideas branched out into other ideas.</p><p>And then Shisui came rolling in through the door plastered to a giant dog. Harry raised his head and peered at the mess of flailing shinobi limbs and canine fur, lifting himself out of the deep mental roads he’d been wandering.</p><p><em>Okay, sure.</em> <em>Giant dogs, why not.</em> It was nowhere near the weirdest creature Harry had seen. Didn’t even break the top <em>twenty</em> weirdest creatures he’d ever seen.</p><p>“I do not believe this constitutes as training, Hana-san,” came Itachi’s voice and Harry looked up to see him trailing a girl his own age or slightly older with red squares painted on her cheeks. Strange fashion, but again, Harry had seen much stranger.</p><p>“I didn’t say it was training, Itachi-san,” said the girl. “I said it was fun. F-U-N. And he’s been so bored since the other two left for their check-up.”</p><p>“…You said they left an hour ago.” Itachi looked uncomfortable and faintly confused. It made Harry’s lips twitch.</p><p>“So. Bored.” The girl, Hana, sniffed haughtily.</p><p>“I guess you’re the teammate Uchiha Fugaku was talking about?” Harry said, turned around in his chair to observe her fully. She was packed with flat muscle and stood with a posture that suggested she was always on the verge of leaping.</p><p>“It’s Fugaku-<em>sama</em>! Or <em>Uchiha-sama</em> even! He’s a clan head, you know,” she said, wagging her finger at him. Then she grinned, showing off braces and slightly crooked teeth. “But yes, that’s me!”</p><p>Right, whatever. A level of respect higher than what was afforded to anyone and everyone by default had to be earned. He’d never in a million years called Malfoy, ‘Mr. Malfoy’ or ‘Lord Malfoy’ just because he was the head of the Malfoys. You could show respect for an office without believing that every person who thought of themselves as representing an office was <em>right</em> in that thought.</p><p>“Nice to meet you,” Harry said and mostly meant it. Hana introduced herself and her dog, Haimaru, and proceeded to listen Haimaru’s barks in a way that let Harry knew that she could understand it. Well, if Hogwarts could have giant sentient spiders among other sentient creatures, why couldn’t this village have sentient dogs? Or people who understood dog-speak?</p><p>Harry turned to the dog in question. “Hello, Haimaru. Nice to meet you.”</p><p>Both Hana and Itachi looked surprised. Harry refused to flush at their stares.</p><p>“What?” It came out a little louder than intended.</p><p>“Nobody really greets the Inuzuka dogs. Not like that, anyway.” She didn’t go anywhere with that statement, reaching down to scratch behind Haimaru’s ears, and Harry couldn’t figure out if it was meant to be mocking, appreciative or just a neutral observation.</p><p>“Shouldn’t you be going?” Shisui asked from where he was lounging in one of the kitchen chairs and drinking from Harry’s half-full cup. Harry couldn’t quite figure out when the cup had migrated from his hand to Shisui’s and eyed the teen thoughtfully.</p><p>Itachi nodded sharply. “Yes. We must reconvene with the client to review mission details before our departure tomorrow.”</p><p>Harry glanced over at him. <em>Seriously, who force-fed this kid a thesaurus? Even Hermione never sounded this stiff.</em></p><p>Shisui nodded. “Uh-huh, you do that. Me and the civilian will stay here and worry about what Shimura is up to.”</p><p>“Danzo-sama was here?” Itachi asked. The kid’s expression turned detached in a way that suggested he was holding back strong emotion.</p><p><em>So he doesn’t like this Danzo guy either</em>. Harry folded the thought away for later contemplation. And then blinked. <em>Hah! Shisui didn’t give him the ‘–sama’ suffix either.</em> Which meant that Harry wasn’t the only one who didn’t believe in showing respect you didn’t think had been earned.</p><p>The evening sort of tapered off after that. Hana made Itachi stay and chat for a bit longer and Harry had the impression she was doing so just to bully him. Mean, but the kid clearly needed the socialization. Or just more friends in general. If push came to shove, Harry could transfigure some more ducklings to trail the kid around. That’d be a start, at least.</p><p>“Do you even have a plan for tomorrow?” Shisui said when the two younger kids finally left, gesturing at him with the cup. He sounded exasperated and the exasperation was infuriating enough for Harry to subtly vanish the remaining tea in a fit of pettiness, the movement disguised as a hair ruffle.</p><p>“Are you going to spend the rest of the night dripping on the floor? I’m taking your floor-mattress in that case.” Harry’s own hair had fully dried, but Shisui’s hair and clothes were still damp.</p><p>“It’s called a futon,” Shisui muttered behind his back as Harry left the kitchen and headed into the bedroom he’d passed earlier. He cast another human-revealing spell as he walked and sucked in a little breath at the three presences perched on top of the roof.</p><p><em>The damn owls are multiplying</em>.</p><p> </p><p>The next day dawned rainy and gray enough to match Harry’s own mood. Shisui had come into the bedroom a while later with an extra futon and plonked himself down on the other side of the room. That had made the three unwelcome guests above seem less threatening. Or maybe it just made Harry feel less alone. Either way, after an hour of putting his ideas in some semblance of order, he’d actually managed to fall asleep.</p><p>“Wakey-wakey, Potter-san,” said Shisui what felt like a minute later, poking at him with his foot.</p><p>“Just Harry. What time is it?” Harry asked, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. He stared grumpily up at the teenage shinobi, wondering half-seriously if it would be worth it to Apparate away and catch some more Z’s in another part of the house. There’d been a sofa in another one of the rooms…</p><p>“Time to go see the Hokage, Just Harry, if the impatient guard at the door has anything to say about it.”</p><p>Harry woke up fully but unwillingly and glared at the cheerful Uchiha.</p><p>“I’m going to wash my face,” he said, stumbling out of the room and lumbering past the guard hovering in the hallway.</p><p>The cold water against his face did even more to wake him up and he used a freshening charm in lieu of a shower to cleanse the rest of his body. Casting the human-revealing spell again, Harry was unsurprised to find two presences on the roof in addition to the guard in the hall.</p><p>
  <em>Ugh.</em>
</p><p>He made his way back out with an extra grump in his step. The guard immediately rushed him and Shisui out the door like a shepherd herding wayward sheep and set them on the path to the Hokage’s tower. The two unwanted presences followed them along the rooftops above. Harry cast a glance at Shisui, wondering if the teenage shinobi knew about them. If he should ask.</p><p>He didn’t.</p><p>When they were finally standing by the Hokage’s door again, yet another <em>Homenum Revelio</em> revealed a handful of presences inside. Harry stopped for a brief moment, wondering if he was walking into some kind of trap. But then the guard opened the door, Shisui ushered him inside and no trap sprung shut around him. The people in the office clustered around the Hokage’s desk, speaking quietly. None of them decided to use him as a dart board.</p><p>But all of them looked up when Shisui pushed the door shut. The Hokage, a large man with a black bandana covering his head, an old woman with her gray hair in a top knot, an old man with green glasses and finally the snakelike Shimura, eyes as cold as chips of arctic ice.</p><p>“Good morning,” said the Hokage and Harry mumbled a polite greeting in return, carefully keeping his gaze from being caught by Shimura’s.</p><p>The Hokage gestured for him to sit and Harry slowly sank down into the one chair before the Hokage’s desk. It put him in a position to stare up at the Hokage’s little gathering and Harry realized immediately that it was probably the intended purpose. His lips tightened and he was sort of relieved when Shisui took up position just behind his right shoulder. Otherwise it would have felt too much like being a lone defendant on trial before a high tribunal.</p><p>The Hokage leaned forward slightly. “I understand you met Shimura Danzo yesterday?”</p><p>“Yes.”</p><p>“Then I needn’t introduce him. He, Utatane Koharu and Mitokado Homura are members of my council. Finally, Morino Ibiki is a member of our Intelligence unit.” The Hokage gestured with his unlit pipe to the gathered members as he made their introductions. The two elders looked like the sort of people who regarded smiling as childish tomfoolery and the younger man was built and scarred like a Spanish fighting bull.</p><p>“They all have some questions.”</p><p><em>I bet</em>, Harry thought, looking them over carefully. The bandana-clad shinobi was the only one among them who didn’t have the feel of someone who’d spent most of their life politicking their way around obstacles.</p><p>“Let’s see if I can give you some answers,” he said and mentally amended <em>if I feel like it</em>.</p><p>“Welcome to our village, young man,” said the old woman and Harry nodded his head. Courteous, at least.</p><p>She went on, “I understand you spent some time with our Hokage’s son and displayed a remarkable set of abilities over the course of your travels together.”</p><p><em>How much has Sarutobi reported to his father?</em> Harry wondered. Probably most of it, and he didn’t even know exactly what Sarutobi had seen, beyond <em>Protego</em> and <em>Stupify</em>. Maybe the effect of <em>Depulso</em> and Apparition as well, but Itachi and his poofy-haired friend had already seen them as well.</p><p>With an internal groan, Harry realized just how much he’d ended up revealing. And that was without even counting the duck, which was what he’d focused most of his mental energy on.</p><p>“My parents taught me most of what I know,” Harry said, voice measured in a way he hoped wouldn’t betray his nervousness.</p><p>“Asuma-kun mentioned as much. I understand you are from an island in Water country?”</p><p>Harry nodded, wondering about the point of this slow dance. He’d been standing right there when Sarutobi mentioned his supposed home country to the Hokage.</p><p>“Whereabouts in Water country?” That was the old man with the glasses butting in, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees. There was a shrewd light in his eyes that Harry didn’t trust. It felt like some kind of greed.</p><p>Harry cocked his head. “I have no intention of telling you that. Nobody left behind there is related to me.”</p><p>The man smiled thinly, the room’s light catching in the green frames of his glasses. “We wish them no harm, only to speak to them.”</p><p>Harry couldn’t help the turning of his lips. “The reason I originally came to this village was because Leaf shinobi kept trying to hurt or kill me for no reason. I have no intention of helping any shinobi find my former home.”</p><p>A pregnant silence resulted and Harry thought he could feel a waver of surprise in the air. The old man’s body language opened and shuttered again, locking whatever his reaction would have been behind a steel wall.</p><p>“But you lived near Hidden Mist?” asked the old woman.</p><p>“Yes.”</p><p>“In the archipelago?”</p><p>“Children sometimes have very short attention spans,” Harry said, tilting a half-scowl her way. “Some adults do too, I guess. <em>I have no intention of helping you find my former home</em>.”</p><p>The old woman drew back, lips pruning in a sour little grimace. She and the old man traded looks – like how Harry imagined a set of grandparents would look at each other before tutting about this generation’s lack of respect for the elderly.</p><p>“It is important to be careful with one’s family background in a place like Mist.” That was Shimura, speaking up for the first time since their arrival at the tower.</p><p>“But..?” Harry said, unwilling to beat around the bush.</p><p>“But you have been granted shelter in this village by the Hokage’s grace.”</p><p>Harry snorted. “Did you miss the part where the only reason I came here was to complain about your shinobi? Shisui was the one to tell me that civilians can and should complain when shinobi act badly.”</p><p>“That was before we were aware that you are a Water country citizen.”</p><p><em>Ah, shit. Improvise, improvise…</em> “I haven’t been in Water country in years. Fire country has been my residence since the first time I set foot here.”</p><p>Close enough to the truth, Harry thought and jutted out his chin in defiance. Let Shimura stare at him with those cold eyes. He wouldn’t give an inch.</p><p>The Hokage was next to speak. “Water country is currently an ally of Fire country, and thus your home country poses no issue.”</p><p><em>Did he just give me an out?</em> Harry tried to nod like what the village leader’s words was an obvious fact to him.</p><p>The Hokage gave him a steady look. “But as mentioned, since you have been given leave to stay in this village despite your status as a foreigner, there are questions in need of answers. Mainly concerning your bloodline limit.”</p><p>There was no real need for Harry’s heart to speed up. He’d thought this through, damn it. As well as he could in such a short amount of time, anyway. He could have used a few more days to hash out the details. Harry took a subtle breath, exhaled on a sigh and brought up a grim smile.</p><p>“What would you like to know?”</p><p>“My son explained your multi-purpose use of a shield. The two shinobi you encountered –”</p><p>“ – that I came here to make a complaint about.” Harry added so brightly and falsely his teeth ached.</p><p>The Hokage paused. “Yes, the two you came here to file a complaint about.”</p><p>Harry nodded and smiled wider. “Itachi apologized for trying to kill me, by the way. So he’s forgiven. No more complaints about him, just about the poofy-haired weirdo.”</p><p>“Delightful,” said the Hokage, sounding like he was longing for retirement. “The two of them witnessed your teleportation as well as your ability to turn a kunai into a duck.”</p><p>Harry sort of admired the man’s ability to say that with a straight face. Shisui was making a sniffing sound that sounded like an aborted laugh. Homura and Utatane looked only slightly befuddled.</p><p>Both Shimura and Morino stayed as stone-faced and unreadable as statues.</p><p>“Uh, so most of my bloodlimit is based on a kind of teleportation that my parents called ‘conjuration’,” Harry started and then did his best to weave a lie as smooth and Slytherin as he could. It was a tale of how his bloodlimit allowed him to move or switch the places of any object within a certain range – including switching himself with tiny pebbles or blades of grass. It was a tale of how, as the bloodlimit evolved, he could force objects and people out of or into movement by switching them with dust motes, coalescing them from parts into a greater whole, dunking them into the ground by making them switch places with hard soil, stopping them from moving briefly…</p><p>It was a crazy, long-ass story and Harry did his best to give it a realistic flare.</p><p><em>Maybe I should have been a Slytherin</em>, he thought, slightly uncomfortable as he trailed off.</p><p>“…And the shield?”</p><p>“That’s one of mom’s techniques,” Harry said, making up the answer on the spot. “I’ll show you…”</p><p>He pushed his wand-hand into his pocket and conjured silver sand. Or, well, silver-colored sand. He wasn’t good enough at conjuration to create genuine precious metals. Or to make so many small objects last for long. He held a handful of the stuff up to show the gathering of scary old people.</p><p>“So I just switch them with the dust motes –” Harry let the conjuration disperse as he cast the <em>Protego</em> and focused hard on making a small silver disk in the air. He focused especially hard on making the shield look like physical silver. In a real fight, putting so much will into the shield’s appearance would have weakened it, but weakening it was of no concern right now. It had to look like a real, physical object to match his story.</p><p>“You need a metal base to form the shield?” Morino’s voice resembled the sound of bricks slowly rubbing together.</p><p>Harry probably pulled a muscle in his neck trying shake his head casually. “Not really. Metal is best for shields, but I could make it out of whatever.”</p><p><em>Thank Merlin my mouth has a mind of its own at times. It just blurts things out without input from my brain.</em> That wasn’t something Harry usually had cause to be grateful for.</p><p>A bead of sweat made its way down his spine. Fuck, this was nerve-wracking.</p><p>“And the duck was a nearby duck you switched with a kunai?”</p><p>Harry nodded. Morino’s voice was as unreadable as his face.</p><p>“Do you always walk around with metallic powder in your pockets?”</p><p>“I used to. Mom made it herself because metal is hard to come by. I used up most of it in the fight against the Rock-nin.” <em>There, that was a solid little add-on lie</em>. Well, semi-solid at least. Not as solid as rock but definitely as solid as, like, jelly. Or some other near-solid material.</p><p>“The bloodlimit uses up the material you switch with?”</p><p>Harry scrambled for an answer. “Only the really small stuff. I think the chakra burns it out?”</p><p><em>Is that the sort of thing chakra can do?</em> <em>Let’s hope it is.</em> Harry tried to be optimistic, but it was getting difficult. The palms of his hands were damp with sweat.</p><p>The Hokage interjected. “I do believe that satisfies our questions. For now.”</p><p>There was an ominous little pause in the sentence that made Harry distrust the Hokage’s calm expression.</p><p>He set his jaw. “And about my complaint?”</p><p>The Hokage nodded. “Of course. I will call the shinobi who was with Itachi-kun that day for a thorough review of your complaint. Could I ask you and Shisui-kun to wait outside so that we may review the details?”</p><p>That was polite. Really polite. Harry’s internal alarms started blaring even as he followed Shisui out of the office. Shisui took up post against the wall while Harry slumped into a nearby stool. Though the air was warm enough, his skin felt chilled even seated directly in the morning sunlight.</p><p>“Hmm.”</p><p>Harry turned slightly to look at the Uchiha. “What?”</p><p>“You’re pretty interesting.”</p><p>Harry’s internal alarms blared louder. Damn it. <em>Damn it</em>. Something was happening here, right under his nose. He drew himself into a jittery stillness, focused on the door to the Hokage’s office, and cast the hearing-improvement charm.</p><p>“— unacceptable, Danzo.” The Hokage’s voice was harder than Harry had ever heard it.</p><p>“But a foreigner lying to Leaf’s highest office is not?” That was Shimura’s voice, as sharp and cold as an executioner’s blade.</p><p>“Ibiki?” The Hokage’s voice again, drained of emotion.</p><p>“Mostly lies, erected on a foundation of truth.” There was a pause where Harry had the opportunity to have a super-quick panic attack. The muscles along his spine tightened, his breath folded into his throat and stayed there.</p><p>Morino continued. “I doubt the lies are for a reason that would threaten Leaf’s interests. He does not have the bearing of a shinobi – it is unlikely that he has been formally taught subterfuge.”</p><p>“But he should be watched. Carefully.” The man’s stone-voice shifted in apparent thought. “My unit has an array of diverse ways to manage such situations.”</p><p>Harry felt like his hair was starting to stand on end. His heels were drumming faintly inside his shoes, like he was about to up and run a race. Just waiting for a muggle gun to go off and send him sprinting.</p><p>“Not yet.” Now the Hokage’s voice was drained of energy rather than emotion. “Not quite yet.”</p><p>That was the most ominous staying of an order Harry could imagine.</p><p>Not quite <em>yet</em>.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Oh, Harry. This is a village with a selection of top-notch professional liars, after all.</p><p>Comments very welcome!</p><p>(Sorry to keep you waiting for this chapter. My tiny and coronavirus-safe Christmas and New Year's celebrations got in the way of my normal writing schedule.)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0010"><h2>10. cage</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Harry tried not to show too much of his panic in Shisui’s presence, though the Uchiha was looking so intently out the window that he appeared to have found his life’s purpose in the treetops visible outside.</p><p><em>I should have planned things out more carefully,</em> Harry thought, pressing the tips of his fingers together and ignoring the fluttering of his heartbeat. <em>I shouldn’t have gone to bed before I had everything laid out in perfect detail.</em></p><p>Detail work had always been Hermione’s field. Harry was the one to make big, sweeping plans and set things in motion, Ron was the one to set the strategic pieces in order, and Hermione was the one to hash out the kinks and polish out the wrinkles.</p><p><em>Think.</em> There was no point in sinking into the feeling of failure. No point in cringing in how certain he’d been that he had things reasonably in hand. No point in worrying what ‘diverse ways’ the Intelligence unit Morino worked for had in mind for ‘managing’ situations like this. Not right now, anyway.</p><p>It was clear by what he’d overheard that Morino was the one who’d been able to see through him the easiest. Which made sense for an Intelligence agent. Harry had read about Intelligence units when he was doing research about post-Hogwarts career paths – there were Auror units with the same specialization.</p><p><em>And yet I didn’t take his specialty into account even though the Hokage mentioned it in his introduction,</em> Harry thought with a blaze of self-directed anger flashing through him. There was that impulsivity everyone always warned him about. Thinking on your feet was all well and good in stressful situations, but situations with political bullshit required more than that. <em>Better</em> than that.</p><p><em>I should learn Legilimency. For real.</em> The basics Hermione had started him on could be built upon with some effort. Because he couldn’t learn however many years worth of schooling in the arts of Intelligence he’d need to match up against an expert in the field. He needed some kind of cheat.</p><p>All these thoughts came and went in less than a couple of minutes, raging through his brain and building on each other. This set-back wouldn’t bring him down. It was just another obstacle in a long line of obstacles. It was just a mistake on his part and catastrophizing mistakes didn’t get you closer to any solutions.</p><p>Harry huffed himself into a more upright position and tuned back into the ongoing conversation in the Hokage’s office.</p><p>“— and you don’t believe he would notice that?” The Hokage sounded like he was considering something, deep in thought.</p><p>“Jounin Sarutobi already has good rapport with him. Given the opportunity to brush up on soft interrogation techniques, he could be discrete enough.” Morino’s voice, stone-blank and assured.</p><p><em>Pretty obvious what their intentions are</em>, Harry thought, hiding a scowl.</p><p>“He mentioned that the civilian seems to mildly distrust and dislike shinobi in general.” That was the Hokage again.</p><p>“That is no surprise, given his previous encounters. That he would come to accept Jounin Sarutobi’s company is more unexpected. But his general distrust is the reason I would discourage the insertion of an entirely new presence into his life here. It is enough of a surprise that he would consent to be questioned, despite his distrust of shinobi and his seemingly having the ability to leave at will. I do not believe another fortunate surprise would be in store if we pushed him much further.”</p><p>There was a pause where Harry imagined the group digesting that information.</p><p>“What are your thoughts on his accent?” That was Danzo, sliding into the conversation like an asp through the grass.</p><p><em>My accent?</em> Harry thought, finding a fresh new concern to worry about.</p><p>Morino answered. “It is not a typical Water country accent, but if his life there was as isolated as implied, that does not necessarily point to anything. An expert in accents could do a better job of identifying it than I.”</p><p>“Staring at the door isn’t going to make their discussion go any faster.”</p><p>Harry jumped. He hadn’t really forgotten the Uchiha’s presence, he’d just sort of almost-forgotten. Shisui was no longer lounging against the wall and staring out the window, but sitting on a footstool a few paces away.</p><p>“What did you think of the meeting?” Harry hedged, slightly rattled by what he’d just heard. Shisui cocked his head like an inquisitive Praslin parrot, eyes deep and serious.</p><p>“I think you need to be more careful.” His gaze shifted slowly over Harry’s features. “How much of that was actually true? Any of it? Most of it? None of it?”</p><p>“I changed all the identifying details. Maybe too many of the identifying details.” That was actually true. He had changed all the identifying details. And also all of the other details.</p><p>“Distrustful, eh?”</p><p>It echoed the words of the scary old people and really scary Intelligence agent still in the office. Harry scowled, mostly on principle. He wasn’t really sure if he minded that the shinobi realized his mistrust. It wasn’t like he’d been that subtle about it.</p><p>“You people don’t inspire much trust, just in general.”</p><p>Shisui grimaced. “I’m sorry. I meant what I said about how shinobi aren’t supposed to be assholes to civilians.”</p><p>“Do the old people in there know about that rule?” Harry muttered. He turned an ear back to the conversation and heard something about a ‘psychological evaluation’ before Shisui spoke up again.</p><p>“You’re the bluntest civilian I’ve ever met.”</p><p>“You’re one of the least assholeish shinobi I’ve ever met.”</p><p>Shisui snorted. “Talk about damning with faint praise.”</p><p>“If you want more praise, you’ll have to strive to be even less assholeish.” As he and Shisui bantered, Harry wondered if the Uchiha had pulled him into small talk on purpose. If he’d meant to draw the tension out of him. Either way, it was working. When their chatter faded and Harry tuned back into the office conversation again, it was with a much less heavy heart.</p><p>“— his tells were not obvious.” The Hokage sounded like he was tapping the ashes out of his pipe.</p><p>“Different cultures have different tells. And he is an unusually accomplished fabricator, especially for a civilian.”</p><p>“It’s the first time I have called in a specialized Intelligence-nin for the questioning of a civilian.”</p><p>The old lady harrumphed. “It was a good thing you did, Hiruzen! The life that boy must have lived to be able to lie to shinobi so brazenly.”</p><p><em>Like lying to shinobi is worse than lying to civilians,</em> Harry thought with a mental eye-roll. But his chest was light with the knowledge that he hadn’t totally failed in his storytelling. They’d called in a specialist because they hadn’t been entirely sure they could read him.</p><p>From inside the office there was the rattling of knuckles against glass and the sound of a window opening.</p><p>“Kakashi-kun, come in.”</p><p>“Hokage-sama.” There was the slight sound of a cat-footed person stepping lightly over wood.</p><p><em>The poofy-haired weirdo!</em> Harry thought, instantly recognizing that drawling voice.</p><p>The glasses-man and the prune-lady summarized the meeting for the new arrival with a varying amount of acerbity, pity and infuriation. It was a cranky but not wholly unamusing summary. They seemed outraged at the thought of a civilian neither showing them the respect they believed they were due, nor spilling the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth immediately upon being questioned.</p><p>“— and he has a complaint about you!” the old lady finished with an extra-huffy huff. Despite himself, Harry struggled not to snicker.</p><p>“A complaint?”</p><p>The Hokage took over, voice as mild as cream. “About you and Itachi-kun attacking him unprovoked.”</p><p>There was a small pause. “…Maa, there may be some slight truth to that.”</p><p>“Then there is little point in delaying this further.”</p><p>The sound of heavy steps came from inside the office before the door was shoved open. Morino tilted his head around the door, his deep eyes catching Harry’s.</p><p>“You will pardon the delay.”</p><p>It sounded like it was meant as a perfunctory apology, but it came out more like an order. Harry nodded anyway. The delay had been pretty useful, all in all. Both in allowing him to calm down and in allowing him to unobtrusively gather information.</p><p>He stepped into the office sandwiched between Shisui and the unreasonably gigantic Morino. Harry’s gaze dragged from the Uchiha to the Intelligence agent and he reflected that just one of Morino’s shoulders were roughly the size of Shisui’s head. The man could probably bench press a centaur.</p><p>
  <em>Big and frightening.</em>
</p><p>Before his thoughts could divert too much, he turned to look at the poofy-haired Kakashi. The man was a lot less scary in the light of the Hokage’s office. His headband was haphazardly tilted over one eye, he was wearing a cloth mask that looked like a navy blue nylon sock and he had the expression of a scatterbrained professor.</p><p>
  <em>I bet he’d love Hog’s weed.</em>
</p><p>“Hello,” the man said with a little wave and a smile that creased his mask. It did little to change Harry new first impression. The shinobi’s grey hair was kind of drooping to the side, like it had first been electrocuted to stand on end and then drenched into a sideways wilt.</p><p>“Hi. You’re not lunging for my throat this time. Much appreciated.” Harry waved back, oozing sarcasm so hard the air dripped with it.</p><p>“You still wish to make a formal complaint to be lodged here in the village?” The Hokage withdrew a pen from one of his oversized sleeves and a sheet of papers from a drawer.</p><p>Harry turned to the village leader, shrugging away the urge to say something even more sarcastic. “Yes. Also about the blonde slug woman.”</p><p>“Of course. If you could summarize your encounters with both Kakashi-kun and the blonde kunoichi..?”</p><p>Harry decided to tell the full truth this time. No point in lying when the truth was damning enough. With an appropriate amount of glares, colourful descriptions of annoying murderers and vehement gesturing, Harry explained his encounters with Itachi, Kakashi and the slug lady.</p><p>“And I was only trying to help!” He finished, realizing as he did so that he actually still <em>was</em> pretty pissed at randomly being attacked when he hadn’t done anything wrong.</p><p>“…Thank you for that vivid and detailed explanation. Kakashi-kun, what have you to say in return?”</p><p>“Well… People are generally not in the habit of interfering with missions out of the goodness of their hearts?” His one visible eye curled in ¼ of a smile.</p><p>“I saw a <em>boy</em> being attacked by a bunch of grown <em>men</em>,” Harry said with an aggrieved exhale. <em>Don’t hex the weirdo, do</em> not<em> hex the weirdo, no matter how satisfying it would be, don’t do it…</em></p><p>
  
</p><p>“Itachi is no boy. He is a skilled shinobi, one who has fought and suffered for the village,” Shimura interrupted, somehow looking even frostier now. Like he thought that what Harry saying was so stupid that he could barely deign to counter it.</p><p>Harry felt his lips peel back. “Suffering doesn’t make you into an adult. Suffering is just suffering. A kid with a knife is just a kid with a knife.”</p><p>Shimura’s eyes seemed to grow colder still. “You are not a shinobi.”</p><p>He said it like that was an instant conversation-ender. Like it was an argument in and of itself, no more discussion required.</p><p>Harry’s lips peeled back further, into the shape of a Grim’s grin. “Nope! Head to toe civilian here.”</p><p>“Which is why we are having this meeting,” the Hokage interjected, voice still mild.</p><p>Harry ripped his gaze from Shimura and towards the village leader’s calm face. He didn’t know what to make of the old man’s expression, but at least the Hokage didn’t have contempt visibly brimming just beneath the surface.</p><p>“There is not much more to say,” said Kakashi, his floppy hair drooping along with the rest of him. Someone should water him before he wilted into a dried little heap.</p><p>“How about an apology?”</p><p>Kakashi gave him a sideways glance. “As I said, people are not in the habit of interfering with missions out of kindness. Especially not civilians.”</p><p>“You don’t value kindness as much as the little murderer, clearly.” He was honestly a bit disappointed, though he probably shouldn’t have been. He had no reason to believe that Kakashi would be as reasonable a sort as Itachi.</p><p>The man’s eyes creased into another smile. “Itachi would be the little murderer, I take it?”</p><p>“Do you spend a lot of time with other little murderers?” Harry asked, a bite to the words.</p><p>One silvery eyebrow rose. “You’d be surprised.”</p><p>“I doubt that, considering how your military is apparently structured.” A bit more tart than he’d wanted and it made the scary old people up their scowls by 50 %. Maybe implicit criticism of their military in the middle of the current mess wasn’t the smartest tack to take.</p><p>Kakashi eye-smiled harder, radiating a kind of forceful cheerfulness that disguised his face more effectively than the cloth mask did.</p><p>“I take it that you do want a lodge a formal complaint.”</p><p>The Hokage’s voice interrupted Harry’s stab at staring the grey-haired shinobi down.</p><p>“I thought that was what I was doing?”</p><p>The Hokage didn’t answer that and Harry thought he must have missed something. The old man’s gaze travelled lightly over the other older shinobi, catching briefly on Shimura before turning to the ceiling. There was something tired, or maybe resigned, about his expression.</p><p>“The complaint against jounin Hatake Kakashi by the civilian Potter Harry will be lodged and archived. Please allow three days for the complaint to be transcribed and reviewed. You will be contacted at the end of this time limit.”</p><p>It was so abrupt that Harry had to take a moment to reel. Just one moment, mind. Because there was a flicker in Shimura’s snake-eyes, a triumphant glitter. He wondered if he was the only one to notice it, or if this was a little undercurrent that everyone in the room could read but him.</p><p>“So I guess I’ll stay with Shisui until then?” Harry finally said, and that was actually a perfect outcome. Surprisingly. He could get a lot of investigating done in three days.</p><p>“The Uchiha clan –” Shimura started, his tone oil-slick and still with that glitter in his eyes.</p><p>“— is happy to host you, Potter-san,” Shisui finished, sliding into the sentence with the precision and ease of a blade slicing through a stick of butter.</p><p><em>Err</em>, Harry thought vaguely as Shisui and Shimura stared each other down with creepy, empty little smiles on both of their faces. <em>More political bullshit?</em></p><p>“So it’s decided,” he said, breaking their staring contest. “Thanks for the invite.”</p><p>Shisui’s polite little smile widened. It didn’t reach his eyes. “If Hokage-sama has no objections..?”</p><p>There was a pregnant pause as both Shisui and Shimura turned weighty gazes on the Hokage. Morino was watching the scene with neutral eyes, but the two old advisers seemed to be struggling for equanimity. The poofy-haired Kakashi had his nose buried in an orange book, looking for all the world like none of this concerned him even remotely.</p><p>“No, I have no objections.” The Hokage smiled gently, steadily, and it still felt like he was issuing some kind of challenge.</p><p>“Great!” Shisui clapped his hands together in an easy gesture, but Harry had the impression that he was relieved in some way. He glanced over at Shimura, at the steel curtain that had carefully shuttered his gaze.</p><p>“As Hokage-sama pleases,” Shimura murmured, bowing so faintly it came across more like a veiled insult than a sign of respect.</p><p><em>This man would make an excellent ferret,</em> Harry mused. He could be a cute, furry little pet for some school-aged kid.</p><p>The meeting sort of broke up after that, without anyone throwing little knives around and without Harry being carted off by the scary Intelligence agent or having anyone call him out for lying. Shisui bundled him out of the office in a flurry of respectful good-byes to the Hokage and the advisers. Harry felt their gazes like laser beams against his back.</p><p>Once they were out of the tower and standing in the open-air light, Shisui shook his shoulders like he was trying to cast off a weighted blanket.</p><p>“Uh… so that was… yeah,” Harry said, raising his hand to maybe pat the Uchiha’s shoulder. Before he could do more than waffle uncertainly with his hand in the air, one of those ANBU people popped out of nowhere. This one had a blank, unpainted mask and the posture of a tin soldier.</p><p>“What are you doing here?” Shisui said, shoulders immediately snapping back into rubber-band tightness. He looked on the verge of either attacking the shinobi or dragging Harry out of his reach. That seemed like a bit of an overreaction, but Harry still angled himself so that his wand-hand was in position.</p><p>“Potter-san’s presence has been requested,” said the ANBU, who was apparently both a woman and a robot. Her voice was as drained of personality as her mask and that sent a little wave of tension up Harry’s back.</p><p>“Requested by whom?” he asked carefully, eyeing the surrounding rooftops for an appropriate Apparition spot.</p><p>“Danzo-sama,” said the woman and reached for him. And everything seemingly happened all at once.</p><p>Harry’s <em>Depulso</em> sent her careening back –</p><p>The woman responded with a bouquet of star-shaped knives –</p><p>Shisui slid in front of him like a human shield –</p><p>– and another blank-masked shinobi appeared behind Harry, wrapped bony fingers around his arm, and hauled him away in a swirl of leaves. Shisui’s startled glance over his shoulder was the last thing Harry saw before the village scenery disappeared from view.</p><p>There was a blip in his consciousness. A sense of being moved, maybe carried or dragged.</p><p>Then he landed on hard ground, the masked shinobi’s hand like a vice around his upper arm. The air was dark and cold. Musky, like in a damp basement. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust, but a moment was all he needed to reinforce his shields and cast a human-revealing spell.</p><p><em>Fuck</em>, Harry thought, jerking a little in his kidnapper’s grasp.</p><p>There were dozens of people here in the darkness. Crouched on the ceiling and in the corners. Hiding in and behind pieces of furniture. Standing silently out in the open, masked faces tilted toward Harry.</p><p>Someone lit a flickering lamp high up on one of the walls, but it did little to ease the oppressive air of what Harry realized was some sort of cave. An unhewn stone dome that couldn’t have looked more like a stereotypical underground lair if it tried.</p><p><em>What’s with assholes and their fondness for caves, anyway?</em> Harry thought, only slightly hysterically. Caves, snakes and masks seemed to be a running theme with his enemies. He tried to catch his breath, rig his brainpan back into full power, find the focus needed.</p><p>“Tera. You succeeded,” said another masked person to the kidnapper, appearing out of the shadows with the walk of a marionette pretending to be human.</p><p>“I would not fail Danzo-sama,” said Tera-the-kidnapper tonelessly. He didn’t even sound satisfied.</p><p><em>I should have figured,</em> Harry thought, teeth grinding together. <em>I should have known just by looking into Shimura’s snake-eyes that something like this would happen</em>.</p><p>He had that air about him. That darkly certain entitlement that all Death Eaters seemed to have, that Voldemort had fucking reeked of.</p><p><em>Fine</em>, Harry thought, lips quirking up without any real amusement. He stood back, took aim and prepared to be swamped by the cave full of pseudo-Death Eaters.</p><p><em>If they want a fight, I’ll give them one</em>.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Good luck and be careful, Harry.</p><p>Comments very welcome, as always!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0011"><h2>11. bars</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The anger stuck in Harry’s throat like a thorny branch. <em>Breathe in, breathe out, calm down</em>. <em>Think.</em></p><p>Most martial charms he knew produced some type of colourful light. Using any of them would be like waving a flashlight in front of a group of moths. And there wasn’t much time to think, to strategize. Whatever plan Shimura and his marching band of creeps had for him, Harry doubted they’d wait long to implement it. Otherwise they wouldn’t have kidnapped him in broad daylight.</p><p><em>Probably. If Shimura didn’t do it with the permission of a higher-up.</em> Harry pursed his lips into a thin, incensed line. <em>Like the Hokage, for example.</em></p><p><em>Now’s not the time to wonder about that. Magic without visible manifestations</em>… Potions wasn’t an option and neither was mind magics. But transfiguration... Harry glanced up, very aware of the grip still around his arm. Not around his wand-arm though, thankfully.</p><p>There wasn’t much to work with in terms of the environment. Except weapons. His eyes had adjusted to the musky darkness enough to catch sight of what looked like weapon racks nailed to the cave walls. From what he could see in a squint, it was mostly rows of little knives.</p><p>That could work. The plan taking form in his mind was barely a plan at all, just a vague sketch of one. But Tera-the-kidnapper was apparently done reporting to his superior or colleague or creepy runaway circus clone, because his grip tightened around Harry’s upper arm.</p><p><em>Now or never</em>. Harry aimed for one of the weapon racks. <em>Avifors!</em></p><p>The knives on the rack disappeared in an eruption of feathers. The metal turned into dozens of screeching birds that took flight on light wings into the darkness. There was an instant an upsurge of awareness in the masked shinobi, a near-physical shift of attention, as everyone’s attention shifted to the commotion.</p><p>Including Tera’s. He didn’t let go of Harry’s arm, but his hold loosened into more of a hover as he equipped himself and took a stance. Harry remained stone-still to avoid drawing attention away from the distraction, sharply narrowed his focus to the darkened end of the room, and Apparated.</p><p>Straight onto a pile of bodies.</p><p><em>Small</em> bodies.</p><p>He stepped on something that broke with the crack of a bone and looked down automatically.</p><p>The image distorted before his eyes. He saw red or black– or the PTSD he’d gotten so much better at ignoring roared through him like a colourless wave, like a gaping void inside him expanding and flushing out doubts and fears. There was a long void of time where Harry’s immediate goals were made and remade within the span of a furious, stuttering heartbeat.</p><p>The smartest thing to do would have been to Apparate back out into the village. If Harry hadn’t been so furious he was trembling with it, he’d probably have done exactly that. Impulse control was harder when you were breakneck mad. The cautioning voice in the back of his head was a whisper competing against a bonfire.</p><p><em>Fuck this, fuck that, fuck it all,</em> Harry thought hazily as he Apparated away<em>away</em>away to the other side of the cave and skidded backwards. A gout of fire raced towards him from somewhere above, a legion of cat-footed steps drew closer, and he Apparated again.</p><p>And again.</p><p>And again. They were so damn fast. The moment he landed anywhere, they were on him. The pursuit did nothing to dampen his fury.</p><p>He half-fell into the wall on the far side to avoid a set of grasping hands. His legs burned with stripes of blood, those little knives slicing marks in his skin as he passed. He could see opened doors with corridors leading away from the cavernous dome of a room. A doubtful but eventual way out. There were probably more of Shimura’s pseudo-Death Eaters in there and he didn’t want to limit his range of movement anyway.</p><p>More fire came at him. The flames swirled like red fog into a gigantic dragon opening a maw full of bright orange death. Harry threw up a <em>Protego</em>, hissed defiance in the face of the scorching heat, and cast <em>Depulso</em> through the dragon’s body. There was the gnashing of breaking stone and the sound of jerky movements, of someone being forced to jump away. The dragon broke apart.</p><p>And in that moment Harry realized shinobi couldn’t <em>choose</em> the direction of their techniques. They couldn’t make something happen wherever, like Harry had with the knives-to-birds transfiguration. Their techniques always came <em>directly</em> from them. That made their exact locations so much easier to track, thank Merlin. If Harry faced the dragon’s maw, that meant there was a shinobi standing at the tip of the dragon’s tail.</p><p>Harry grinned like a hyena and stopped to suck in a breath –</p><p>– which he shouldn’t have done, because a hand emerged out of the ground and twisted around his ankle. The hold was steel-firm and he couldn’t Apparate without taking the shinobi with him. Not with a grip that tight. His heart hammered in his throat but panic was a distant cousin to his careless fury.</p><p><em>Depulso!</em> At the very last second he aimed slightly to the side. Otherwise he would have shattered the shinobi’s arm. Maybe more than just his arm. It would have fed a dark satisfaction in him that Harry refused to nourish, even with a head full of rage.</p><p>The ground broke and the grip around his ankle broke with it. Harry was set to dart away – and crashed into another shinobi appearing out of the darkness. In his peripheral vision he could see more of them hovering just out of reach.</p><p>Like they were herding him.</p><p><em>Fuck that.</em> Panting, Harry swept another <em>Depulso</em> in a wide arch around himself. It sent them through the air, crashing against the walls like bugs against a windowpane.</p><p>“Are you unable to form jutsus with your non-dominant hand?” said the shinobi Harry had just crashed into, apparently having ducked under the spell.</p><p>Now the panic did rise up and slash through the fury.</p><p><em>Shit. Too careless.</em> Harry cast a <em>Stupify</em> on instinct alone. The shinobi darted aside like he’d expected it.</p><p><em>Arresto Momentum!</em> It had neither a required wand movement nor any colour. Nothing there for a shinobi to track. And it caught the shinobi in its grasp <em>beautifully.</em></p><p>Harry’s relief was a feral thing. He’d slowed the fighter down enough that he was moving at an easily visible speed. It wasn’t anywhere near stopping him entirely, but it was enough. Maybe it would have succeeded fully if he’d cast it verbally.</p><p>“<em>Stupify</em>,” Harry breathed aloud and the man slammed into the ground. Another shinobi immediately moved in to drag the man away, spitting a handful of long needles like arrows from a longbow. Harry batted them away in another <em>Depulso</em>-swipe.</p><p><em>Accio</em>. He aimed for the stunned man and the spell forced him out of his comrade’s grasp.</p><p>“I can see why Danzo-sama is interested in you, beyond the ability you have to detect undetectable poisons. The upper chunin contingent was expected to put up a better fight.”</p><p>Harry let the Accio go and the man crashed into the ground. Here was another dead-voiced person, this one emerging from one of the corridors. Her mask was subtly different in a way Harry couldn’t place and couldn’t bring himself to care about. She made a little hand symbol and spat out a swarm of insects.</p><p>
  <em>Gross. These rude people just keep getting ruder.</em>
</p><p>They swarmed as a black mist, like death by a thousand tiny insectoid cuts. Harry cast another <em>Protego</em> before they could decide to dive-bomb him. He turned on the spot and stopped abruptly on his heel when another shinobi came up before him.</p><p><em>Merlin damn it all, how many of them </em>are<em> there?</em></p><p>“I should have retrieved you at the inn,” said the man, his voice dimly familiar. Before Harry could do more than register that slight familiarity, the crowd of insects swarmed around the edge of the shield. Snarling, he enhanced the Membrana shield against his skin and Apparated away.</p><p><em>Why didn’t he attack me?</em> Harry thought, realizing that there was some snare here that he wasn’t seeing. Before he could do more than acknowledge a spike of anxiety, two shinobi spouted like asphalt flowers from the floor. Harry stumbled back before they could do more than reach for him.</p><p>
  <em>Epoximise!</em>
</p><p>The two stayed stuck half-buried in the floor, wiggling like worms in hard soil. Then a stunning spell to disable them completely, a human-revealing spell to check the surroundings, and finally a very sincere wish to just crawl into bed and stay buried under the covers.</p><p>
  <em>Fucking impulsivity. Merlin, what a cock-up.</em>
</p><p>There were less people in the cave now, but all of the transfigured birds had been dealt with and –</p><p>every – single – masked face was turned in his direction. Watching. Waiting.</p><p><em>It </em>is<em> some kind of test. Some kind of assessment.</em> Harry hissed. <em>It </em>is<em> a fucking trap. Just not the kind I thought.</em></p><p>“Your abilities are hard to gauge,” said the kunoichi, her head slightly inclined. Harry twitched. Partially at her voice so close by, partially at the knife that glanced off the Membrana shield over his right leg, splitting the material of his trousers in a fine line.</p><p>“I live to displease,” Harry panted and blew up the floor at her feet. Blah, blah caution. He’s already screwed it up, might as well screw it up some more. <em>Fuck</em> caution.</p><p>The kunoichi disappeared again, but there was another to take her place. That seemed to be a theme with these people. An endless, faceless army.</p><p><em>Not exactly my first time</em>, Harry thought, grimly amused to the marrow of his bones.</p><p><em>Reacting</em> was landing in a pile of small remains and flashbacking into an uncontrollable fury. <em>Acting</em> was tallying up the surrounding shinobi in his mind and calculating the right spells for the fourteen shinobi scattered around the room.</p><p>Acting was the making the decision that, come hell or high water, they were all going <em>down</em>.</p><p> </p><p>Shisui hated politics. They often made little sense and even when they did, they were generally overly complicated and dishonest. Especially in a shinobi village. Sometimes it seemed to him that shinobi were so paranoid that they failed to accurately see the world around them for what it was. Failed to see its people for what they actually were, instead of the threat they could be.</p><p>Sometimes he wondered if the hidden villages weren’t a little more prone to creating their own enemies than they’d like to admit, just by treating everyone like a hidden kunai poised in the dark. Or else by treating them only as potential resources to be squeezed of all vital juices that could possibly water the village’s interests.</p><p><em>I’m an awful shinobi</em>, Shisui thought, snorting. No wonder Fugaku-sama was unimpressed by his progress, despite his reputation as a speedster. A shinobi’s career was built on a particular mindset as much as a particular skillset.</p><p>Morino Ibiki emerged from a side-street, leisurely as you please, and Shisui gave him a wry smile, unsurprised. The T&amp;I agent cut an imposing, ominous figure even in the midst of the village’s daily bustle.</p><p>“So we’re handing out ANBU hand signals to Root ops now?”</p><p>“The ANBU-G8 alphabet is about to be made obsolete.” Morino’s voice was a still as ever. Apparently Itachi thought well of the interrogator, but Shisui found his well-bottom eyes a fount of nightmares. Interrogators always seemed to have that sort of quality to them.</p><p>“Hokage-sama OK-ing this?” Shisui asked. The Root bastard had flashed an ANBU-sanctioned-standby sign but Shisui had still wanted to take the bastard’s head off when he made off with the civilian.</p><p>“More or less.” Noncommittal as ever. As though Morino would ever act through Root operatives without the Hokage’s explicit permission.</p><p>Fucking politics.</p><p>Shisui withdrew a cigarette from a pocket and lit it with a flick of chakra. His mother would end him if she found he’s taken up smoking again after she and Itachi had finally badgered him into quitting.</p><p>“And what do you want from me?”</p><p>Morino’s eyes slid towards him, unhurried as anything. “A rescue.”</p><p>Shisui sputtered a laugh. Of course. “A supposedly ‘rogue element’ kidnaps him and then the nice Leaf shinobi he already knows swoops in to save him and punish the ‘evildoer’, adding an instant boost to our rep with him. A boring, predictable classic.”</p><p>“You object?”</p><p>“I think you’re fucking this up and that it’s gonna explode in ya’ll’s faces.” Shisui took a series of small, aggravated puffs of his cigarette. Fucking Danzo, this was his plan to the core.</p><p>“There are alternative paths to explore, but this one is our first avenue.”</p><p>Meaning that Morino hadn’t been all for it either. That was some relief. Shisui eyed him through the nicotine-laden smoke and wondered how the discussion had ended after he and Potter left. Had Danzo and his old hanger-ons badgered Hokage-sama into this?</p><p><em>And then Hokage-sama gave way to soothe their egos after he allowed Potter to stay with the Uchiha clan</em>. Shisui would bet everything he had on that being the rough outline of how the rest of the meeting had gone down.</p><p>He chewed on the cigarette for a long moment before speaking. “So when should I go play hero?”</p><p>Morino explained the bare bones of what was expected of him and finished by handing him a mission scroll with the exact details.</p><p><em>It’s an actual mission, which means they planned this kidnapping plot well in advance</em>. Shisui snapped the scroll open and glared down at Mitokado’s elegant kanji. He finished reading and spat out what remained of his cigarette.</p><p>“What exactly is the expected fallout here?” he asked. If his voice was a little flatter and less respectful than it should have been when speaking to a superior officer, Morino wasn’t the sort to comment on the lapse in professionalism.</p><p>“Mainly intelligence gathering. We wish to establish a mental profile and acquire a better idea of his abilities.”</p><p><em>Who is ‘we’ in this scenario?</em> Shisui thought but didn’t say. <em>T&amp;I? Root? Hokage-sama? </em><em>The Council? ANBU?</em></p><p>“Guess I’m off then, huh?” He gave as sincere a salute as he could and flickered away.</p><p>The location in the scroll was only a few blocks away, near the western wall. One of Danzo’s little hideaways. That old man gave Orochimaru-sama a run for his money when it came to creepy hidden lairs.</p><p>Shisui made his way through a narrow tunnel, wondering just how badly Potter would be hurt. Hokage-sama wouldn’t have allowed any damage that couldn’t be healed and he was rarely in favour of torture, but Root was only nominally under the Hokage’s control.</p><p><em>Mitokado didn’t seal in any medical supplies</em>, Shisui noted as he made his way deeper down the tunnel. Hopefully that meant the kid wasn’t supposed to be truly hurt in this ridiculous plot. As it was, Potter would likely be out of his wits. Perhaps that was the point, since frightened people were less likely to notice inconsistencies and would thus also be less likely logic their way to the truth. And more likely to be happy to be saved by a conveniently timed hero, swooping in to save the day and score some goodwill on behalf of the village.</p><p>Shisui hated thinking badly of Leaf. He loved the village and its people. He’d been under solid leadership here, he had real friends and his work made a difference in the world. But fuck if it didn’t have enough of a dark side for him to occasionally agree with Itachi’s vague ideological statements against the shinobi world’s doings.</p><p>He was so deep in his musings that he almost tripped on three dead birds lying spread-winged on the floor of the tunnel. The air here was a pungent mix of deep soil and chemicals. Moisture clung to the hewn stone-and-dirt walls, climbing inside Shisui’s collar and along his back.</p><p><em>How the hell did a bunch of birds get down here?</em> He frowned as he stepped around the feathered corpses. Had Danzo taken to experimenting with underground bird-keeping?</p><p>He progressed through the tunnel and had to step around even more dead birds scattered over the ground. Some bore clear kunai marks, some had been bludgeoned to death. There was something eerie about them – he recognized pigeons and sparrows, but there were also what seemed like oversized hawks and large blue birds with gigantic gleaming tail feathers that looked like creatures out of a fairy tale.</p><p>And then there was the silence. Every shinobi recognized a post-battle silence, that feeling a violent air put to stasis, like a breath held tight in your chest.</p><p>The end of the tunnel was in sight and Shisui slowly withdrew a kunai. Mostly because of the oppressive silence and the empty-eyed birds staring up at him as he passed, rather than because he thought it was needed for his intended mission. But Root shinobi couldn’t be trusted any more than Danzo. This silence couldn’t be trusted. They could have dealt with the civilian harshly enough that Potter couldn’t make a sound.</p><p>Where tunnel ended, a gigantic, cave-like room spread out. The air was just as heavy here and Shisui’s nose recognized the post-battle smells before his eyes adjusted to the few lamps timidly lighting up the room.</p><p>All along the stony floor people were laid out like petals scattered in a storm.</p><p>Shisui spotted two buried up to their chests in the floor and one sticking partially out of the wall opposite him. Five shinobi were frozen in place, as if time had stopped moving for them. His eyes adjusted further and he crouched down to make himself a lesser target as he gathered what he could from the scene.</p><p>In places the floor seemed to have melted, and in other places it seemed to have turned into grass or sand or even glass. One shinobi had a head the size of a melon and another had one of those large orange squashes that were grown in southern Wind stuck on his head. One shinobi seemed to have lost the bones in his arms and legs, the appendages dangling like noodles from his shoulders and hips.</p><p>It only took Shisui a couple of seconds to spot all this. It took him another second to catch sight of Potter. The civilian was sitting against the back wall of the room surrounded by downed birds, insects and shinobi, dipped so far into the shadows that his face couldn’t be made out.</p><p>“…Potter-san?” Shisui said, creeping out from his crevice. He felt like he should either raise his kunai and prepare for a fight or tuck it away entirely, with no room for anything between those two extremes.</p><p>Potter looked up, acid-green eyes blank but nowhere near empty. Only when he shifted slightly did Shisui notice the white mask in his hands.</p><p>“Hello, Shisui.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I'm not gone! Just working so much overtime that I haven't been able to sit down and write continuously for a while. I still intend to answer all your comments, 'cause I love the reader engagement ;)</p><p>Comments very welcome, as always!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0012"><h2>12. fallout</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>There was a silence that came after every kind of battle, Harry knew. Kind of like the world was holding its breath or like a heavy rain quietening into clear skies. But that kind of silence also happened on the inside, he’d found. After the Hogwarts massacre, there had been a kind of ringing silence in his head that had blanketed all other sounds into a haze.</p><p>Harry sat in the cavernous room, staring down at the mask of the pretend inn attendant who’d tried to poison him what felt like eons ago, and listened to that ringing silence. With the awareness that always sharpened his senses in dangerous situations, he felt Shisui slowly moving closer.</p><p>“Have you been harmed?” the Uchiha asked, his strained voice rippling through the quiet. Harry looked up from his perusal of the mask, gaze tracking slowly towards the other teen.</p><p>“I’m fine,” Harry said and wished for his friends to roll their eyes at his customary lie of an answer. There was a brimming readiness in him, leftover adrenaline with nowhere to go, banked by a core-deep weariness that made his mouth taste like ash. The silence was so <em>loud</em>.</p><p>“Your arms are bleeding,” Shisui said, still in the same tone of voice. Some combination of trying not to spook a young colt into running and a cautious awareness of a wild dog’s fangs.</p><p>“So are my legs,” Harry noted, shifting a little. There wasn’t lot of pain, but that would come later, when the adrenaline had faded. Finally he looked up and caught the other teen’s eyes.</p><p>“I have a few more complaints to make to your Hokage.”</p><p>It should have sounded like a joke, but it came out as something close to a threat. Apparently. Because Shisui sort of stiffened, his hand jolting to and away from his weapons’ pouch. He didn’t complete the movement, even took a few steps closer, but there was an alertness in his movements that made Harry wonder what he looked like to the other teen. What the room looked like.</p><p>It was difficult to remember the tail-end of the battle, like trying to recall the full contents of a dream. There were flashes of memory, feeling and sound. The pulsing in his veins, the sharp awareness of every muscle movement, the rush of magic and beneath it all, that deep, trembling fury.</p><p>Shisui cleared his throat. “I’m sorry this happened, Potter-san. I give you my word that I had no part in planning it.”</p><p>Harry wasn’t sure how much Shisui’s word could be trusted, but his instincts read the teen as sincere.</p><p>“Is it alright if I come closer?”</p><p>Harry looked him over, feeling the deep thump-<em>thump</em> of his heart against his ribs. “Would you listen if I said no?”</p><p>Shisui’s eyes flickered over the room. “Yes. And I imagine you’d have ways to make me listen if you wanted.”</p><p>Though he noted the veiled question in the words, Harry let the sentence fade into the silence. He followed the other teen’s gaze to one of the downed shinobi. “I get the impression they’d been planning this for some time. Since Tanzaku Gai, at least.”</p><p>Shisui’s lips tightened. He didn’t look surprised.</p><p>“Shimura Danzo is in charge of this particular circus act, right?” Harry asked, fingers flexing around the edges of the mask. Its features reminded him of white-faced mime makeup.</p><p>“What makes you think that?”</p><p>“They were calling him ‘Danzo-sama’. Didn’t seem like they were all that concerned with being secretive about who exactly was pulling their strings.”</p><p>Perhaps they hadn’t expected him to be in a state to report it to anyone. Or else they’d known that even if he did tell someone, it wouldn’t have mattered.</p><p>“I think you should report this to Hokage-sama,” said Shisui, as though sharing Harry’s train of thought, but there was something off about his tone. Something not quite honest. Or else something displeased. It was difficult to entirely parse the tone, especially as the teen was still a few paces away.</p><p>Harry let the thought go. Shisui’s suggestion was a good one, if perhaps not for the reasons the Uchiha assumed. Harry had all sorts of things he wanted to ask, tell and demand of the Hokage. His gaze flicked from where those small remains had previously been laid out and then back to the mask. His pockets were heavy with nightmares.</p><p>“You’re quite a ruthless lot,” he said quietly, lips twisting. It had been a while since he was last so completely unimpressed by a group of people.</p><p>“Yes, we are.” Shisui didn’t sound too impressed either. He took a few steps closer and Harry leaned back to watch him come. The Uchiha had made that shift from normal person to shinobi between one heartbeat and the next, his steps turning cat-footed and his movements lithe as silk.</p><p>“Whose mask is that?”</p><p>“An old acquaintance, I guess,” Harry muttered, lips tight. How long had these people been after him? How had they known that there was anything about him worth their interest?</p><p>Shisui nodded, eyes a little wary. “How many of them did you kill?”</p><p>Harry twitched, blinked and threw a hard look at the other teen. The room’s weak lamplight sparked, casting scattered shadows over the cave walls.</p><p>“<em>I don’t kill</em>.”</p><p>The lamplight crested high, dissolved into embers and returned to normal.</p><p>Shisui jerked back on his heels in a way that spoke of defensiveness. After a moment he rocked out of the slight shift of stance, brows furrowed over his dark eyes.</p><p>“…They’re alive? All of them?”</p><p>“Yeah. Some took off,” Harry said, gesturing vaguely towards the various openings that led to the corridor-tunnels. He should probably have chased after them, but that hadn’t been his priority.</p><p>“Okay. That’s… that’s good.” Shisui nodded, seemingly to himself. Harry couldn’t read his expression. There was a dose of wariness there still, but there was also a muddle of something bright and weirdly satisfied. The teen stopped his perusal of the room and turned back to Harry.</p><p>“You wanted to report this to Hokage-sama?”</p><p>Anger flared hot in Harry’s chest. He nodded tightly and rose to his feet. Shisui immediately regained his defensive stance, but when Harry didn’t go for his throat or whatever he was expecting, he stood down again.</p><p>“After you.” The Uchiha gestured to the same tunnel he’d emerged from.</p><p>“I don’t think so,” Harry said, working hard to stay even remotely pleasant. “You’re here on orders, right? After <em>you</em>.”</p><p>Shisui moved with careful deliberation into the tunnel and Harry followed, acutely aware of how tense the other teen’s back was. That was sort of infuriating. Harry had never once hurt anyone without good reason. He didn’t even like this kind of fighting. Well, he mostly didn’t like it. The adrenaline, the push-pull of movements and complex spellweaving was an enjoyable challenge when masked assholes weren’t trying to kill him.</p><p>They emerged from the tunnels and into village proper in silence. The walk to the Hokage’s tower was so quiet it gave Harry the opportunity to get a little angry. Or rather a little <em>more</em> angry, like sprinkles atop the sundae of his previous fury. He cast the human-revealing spell by habit and was unsurprised to find people trailing them over the village’s rooftops.</p><p>Harry kind of steamed silently up until Shisui knocked on the Hokage’s door. Right about then, he boiled over.</p><p>“WHAT THE HELL ARE YOUR ASSHOLE ADVISORS DOING?” he greeted the Hokage, who stopped mid-motion and looked over. Then glanced to the right.</p><p>Where Shimura was standing.</p><p>“By <em>asshole advisors</em> I was referring to you, if that wasn’t clear,” Harry said, baring his teeth at the creepy old man. “If this was supposed to be some cloak-and-dagger bullshit, your herd of mimes shouldn’t have been bleating about ‘Danzo-sama’ this and ‘Danzo-sama’ that.”</p><p>The snake-eyed old man opened his mouth, so Harry threw the mask he was still holding at Shimura’s wrinkled, one-eyed face.</p><p>“KEEP YOUR MIME-FACED HAREM IN LINE.”</p><p>Then he swung to face the Hokage, who was pinching the bridge of his nose. Looking tired, like he was the one who’d been kidnapped by slavishly devoted pseudo-Death Eaters. Like he’d been the one thrust into a sudden death-match against a fucking army.</p><p>“What the bloody hell is going on? Why have this old guy’s followers been stalking me since Tanzaku Gai?” Harry took a deep breath, certain that having an aneurysm would probably lessen the impact of his words.</p><p>“If you could start from the beginning, Potter-san?” the Hokage asked mildly. Harry felt a muscle in his cheek twitch. None of this two-faced diplomatic politician bullshit. Mild manners hiding daggers – literally, in this case.</p><p>“Do I need to? I’d have figured that if this bloke is your advisor, he wouldn’t act without your say-so.” Harry tried for politeness, but it came out like poison.</p><p>“I would certainly hope that none of my advisors would act without my orders.” He looked over at Shimura with eyes like painted marbles.</p><p><em>What</em>. What was with the staring contest between the old men? He wasn’t here to watch them eye-hate-fuck each other.</p><p>“I’m not here to watch you eye-hate-fuck each other,” Harry said, because now was the time to speak his mind no matter how much Shisui was coughing and sputtering in the background.</p><p>The Hokage’s eyes slid to him in a way that made him kind of… yeah. This man was angry-Dumbledore levels of scary, actually. If Harry hadn’t been so angry himself, he’d probably have caved before the calm warning in those eyes.</p><p>“Potter-san, please keep in mind that you are a guest in this village.” The old man took a long drag of his pipe. “As well as the fact that I am this village’s ruler. I can appreciate a certain level of ease in one’s words, but I do not appreciate vulgarity.”</p><p>The hypocrisy made Harry see red. Redder. Whatever. His hands shook slightly when he shoved them into his pockets and withdrew two small, carefully wrapped appendages. Both the bandaging charm and the extension charm could be used in all manner of ways, including for nightmare-inducing things.</p><p>“And I don’t appreciate being kidnapped into a room full of child corpses.”</p><p>There was a heat behind his eyes that could have been tears or rage. The lights overhead popped, the shadows grew and warped. The room’s air twisted too hot, then too cold. The wooden walls creaked like they were flexing beneath the exquisite wallpaper.</p><p>“Judging by this, I figure your tolerance for vulgarity is a lot higher than mine.” He was shaking and so were the walls. Clatter-clatter-clatter, like the sound made by a gigantic wooden windchime. The wallpaper ripped in places, burned in others.</p><p>Masked ANBU appeared in the corners, facing him and blocking the Hokage partially from view. These were normal masked assholes with animal disguises instead of those faceless uglies from before.</p><p>“Stand down.”</p><p>Harry was almost slapped out of his careless fury by the power in the Hokage’s voice. The man hadn’t moved, hadn’t shifted a hair, but the air suddenly had the pressure of a bulldozer. And the ANBU stood down immediately, melting back into the corners and disappearing from sight.</p><p>From where it had been fastened on the appendages Harry had thrown on the floor, the Hokage’s gaze slid right again.</p><p>“Danzo, my old friend, would you mind elaborating?”</p><p>“They are from the old experiments, I imagine.” Shimura could pull off a fairly convincing nonchalant shrug for a man holding his cane in such a white-knuckled grip.</p><p>“There is no sense in not reusing old facilities, but I distinctly recall having all of my student’s laboratories cleaned out.” The Hokage’s voice was so mild that Harry would have exploded again if not for the darkness in the man’s eyes. There were all sorts of hidden edges in that gaze.</p><p>“It served a function this time,” Shimura said, which seemed like a non-sequitur until the Hokage’s gaze deepened further.</p><p>“Which function is that?” he asked, voice still mild as new snow.</p><p>“Response gauge,” Shimura said and his gaze kind of flickered to Harry. Under a thin coat of stoicism, he looked sort of gratified.</p><p>A hot breath rasped between Harry’s teeth like a parseltongue hiss. His throat felt like sandpaper.</p><p>“<em>Response gauge</em>?”</p><p>The lights flickered again. Flickered and flickered and flickered out with a sharp gasp of electricity that made the air reek of burnt metal. The ANBU in the corners shifted with the sound.</p><p>“Those are real dead bodies and since they’re not decomposed, they’re obviously <em>recent</em>! What, you just had a bunch of kid bodies lying around in want of some strategic use?”</p><p>The walls were shivering harder now and the shadows were lengthening like dark, fast-growing vines.</p><p>“They were in storage for further investigation.” Shimura held himself still, gaze roving like a predator before the leap, his hand around the cane’s head squeezing the metal knob. It reminded Harry of how Malfoy Sr would flick his thumb against the top of his own polished cane before drawing his wand.</p><p>“They were held in storage in preparation for their families to be identified.” That was the Hokage again, tapping ashes out of his pipe. The only light left in the room, coming from the windows, backlit him into a shadowy statue whose expression Harry couldn’t make out.</p><p>“Their bodies have not been further damaged,” Shimura said with a quick glance at the bandaged limbs still on the floor. And it was such an easy, casual look. Like it didn’t really matter that somewhere, there might be families beset by grief waiting desperately for news of their loved ones.</p><p>“They’re in <em>pieces</em>.” Harry said. His voice was quiet but didn’t hide one iota of his disgust. That dark urge he was so desperate not to cater to was rising up beneath the surface waves of fury. It rode atop the knowledge that he’d previously used two of the three Unforgivables successfully and that there was just one final line he’d refused to cross.</p><p>He let that urge dissipate on a deep exhale. The lights slowly flickered back on and there was a reversal of an invisible <em>something</em> in the room, the sense that some heavy energy was withdrawing from the air.</p><p>Harry would never be anything like Voldemort. He’d never give in to the darker whispers in the back of his mind. But he would absolutely show these people what havoc an angry light wizard could wreak.</p><p>“What the hell did you do this for?” he breathed, but directed the question mostly towards the Hokage. It was clear that while Shimura was the one directly behind this mess, he couldn’t have been behind it without the village leader’s authorization.</p><p>“When given the opportunity to explain yourself, you lied to our faces,” said the Hokage quietly.</p><p>Harry balked. “<em>Explain myself</em>? What explanations do you think you’re owed? The only reason I’m here at all is because one of your shinobi invited me after several other of your shinobi attacked me for no reason!”</p><p>“This is a hidden village, Harry-san.” The old man braided his fingers together and rested his chin on his knuckles. “It should have come as no surprise to you that we would attempt information gathering.”</p><p><em>Merlin, they’re </em>all<em> like this. They </em>all<em> think like this.</em> Harry’s thoughts crashed against each other as he checked the expressions of the shinobi in the room and realized that this wasn’t personal, it was <em>cultural</em>. They weren’t secretly aware that a random foreigner who’d done them no harm owed them nothing, while choosing going ahead with their plots for strategic but asshole-ish reasons anyway. They thought they were in the right in a non-assholeish way. The Hokage clearly thought he was explaining something that should have been <em>obvious</em>.</p><p>Harry’s unsolved fury was turning into a headache. If he didn’t need to investigate the Sharingan, he’d have Apparated out of this damn village and never looked back.</p><p>“So in other words, you never had any intention to investigate my original complaints?” he finally asked.</p><p>The Hokage drew himself up. “Uchiha-kun is right that we look poorly on shinobi mistreating civilians. Your complaints will be investigated in full and official penalties will be determined.”</p><p>“You don’t consider being kidnapped, landing in a pile of corpses and being forced to fight a faceless army to be ‘mistreating civilians’?”</p><p>The Hokage’s lips pressed into a thin line. “That was definitely not this information-gathering endeavour’s intended course.”</p><p>Shimura stiffened again, which was at least somewhat satisfying.</p><p>Harry relaxed his jaw, arms crossed over his chest. “Good, because I would like to lodge complaints against you and Shimura for that particular mistreatment. And since this is the worst mistreatment I’ve experienced so far, I’d like this complaint to be the number one priority.”</p><p>Shisui made a strangled little noise behind him.</p><p>The Hokage didn’t bat an eye. “Noted, Potter-san. I’ll update the official record. Until then, I expect you’ll stay with the Uchiha clan?”</p><p>Half a question, mostly a carefully-phrased order. Harry frowned, though that had indeed been his intention.</p><p>“Hokage-sama, I do not believe –” Shimura began.</p><p>Harry’s wand-arm was crossed beneath his non-dominant arm, wand-hand peeking out behind the elbow and pointed straight at the one-eyed bastard. Harry stayed focused on the Hokage, face like stone other than his lips pursing as he focused.</p><p>Shimura stopped speaking as soon as the charm hit him and remained still for a long moment. If Harry didn’t find the man and what he stood for utterly enraging, he might have been impressed. Ron had told him exactly what it felt like when slugs started wriggling up the oesophagus and it had sounded truly revolting.</p><p>“Yes, I’ll stay with Shisui and his family,” Harry told the Hokage, who moved his gaze from his age-mate to Harry.</p><p>“Danzo appears to have come down with something. Hopefully it’s nothing serious.” There was a question barely hidden in that gently threatening statement.</p><p>“I doubt it’s anything he won’t recover from within a couple of hours,” Harry said. “Unlike me, who’ll probably have nightmares about dead kids and psychotic kidnappers for days. And unlike the parents of these ‘response gauge’ children, who’ll probably have nightmares for the rest of their lives.”</p><p>Shimura abruptly stalked out, his cane clacking against the floor as he went. It made him sound like a large, scuttling insect. Harry glanced after him, wondering if he’d make it to whatever hidey-hole he lived in before the slugs started making their appearance.</p><p>“There is a thin line between courage and foolhardiness,” said the Hokage, a frown tugging lightly on the corners of his mouth.</p><p><em>And Gryffindors spit in the face of that line</em>, thought Harry fiercely. Yeah, he’d fucked up and shown more of his abilities than he’d meant to. But some lines had to be crossed. He obviously couldn’t bullshit these people and they were too cold-blooded for faked politeness and cooperation to work. He might as well shine up his spine, bare his fangs and charge ahead.</p><p>“There’s an even thinner line between pragmatism and callousness,” Harry said, which was half a reply and half an accusation.</p><p>The old man rubbed the bridge of his nose, his age suddenly stark in the deep-set lines of his face. “That is also true. I think we could all use some time to settle ourselves, so I shall see you again in a few days.”</p><p><em>Uh-huh. Right.</em> More like the Hokage would receive the full report of what Harry had done and then he and his advisors would cook up another plot. He supposed he should be thankful that they weren’t throwing him into their version of Azkaban, but that seemed pretty suspicious in and of itself. There was probably some strategic manoeuvring baked into that freedom.</p><p>“So that’s settled!” said Shisui, tone high and artificially bright. He was hovering behind Harry like an anxious bird.</p><p>“Do take care of him, Uchiha-kun,” the Hokage said and there wasn’t much thinking required to recognize the hidden meaning there.</p><p>“Of course, sir! Let’s go, Potter-san,” said the teen and reached for Harry’s arm. He stopped before his fingers closed around Harry’s elbow, eyes flicking up.</p><p>“Sure,” Harry said, but he couldn’t be bothered to paint on a smile. “Let’s go. I probably need help treating my wounds anyway.”</p><p>Only then did Shisui’s hand close around Harry’s elbow, gently tugging him out the door. Harry glanced over his shoulder, gaze catching first on the scattered appendages on the floor and then the damaged wallpaper before moving up to the Hokage’s tired face.</p><p>The old man stared calmly back at him until the door closed.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>This was a pretty fun chapter to write &gt;:) The fallout will continue in the coming chapter, though there'll probably be a little breather before the real consequences show.</p><p>Comments very welcome!</p><p>May 5th 2021 note: I'm slammed at work with very little free time right now, which is why the next chapter is delayed. I promise I'll still do my best to answer all your comments. Thank you all for your patience :)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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